This interactive simulation was created to give students in DIG 3171 (Tools for the Digital Humanities) and ENC 3241 (Writing for the Technical Professional) a failure-free introduction to GitHub Sites. Inspired by a colleague’s GitHub simulation created to teach graduate students how to use the desktop version of GitHub, which I have described elsewhere as an example of future-facing interactive technical communication, I used the free version of Claude (Sonnet 4.5) and my university’s enterprise version of CoPilot to create a step-by-step simulation of the GitHub web interface to walk students through each step of forking (copying) my template portfolio, customizing their new home pages, and enabling the Pages feature to publish their website (DIG 3171; ENC 3241).
This took many iterations and re-prompting to fine-tune, and though it still is not perfect, it is enough to familiarize students with where things are in the GitHub interface. AI tools like Claude and others are bridging the gap between technical skills and educators of all disciplines, allowing those with even very little coding knowledge to create interactive digital experiences that provide innovative ways for students to engage with course content.