Brent Laster

In this workshop, we'll cover the options, tips, and tricks for using GitHub Copilot to help us identify how to test code, generate tests for existing code, and generate tests before the code.

Join global trainer, speaker, and author of the upcoming book, Learning GitHub Copilot, Brent Laster as he presents material on multiple ways to leverage Copilot for testing your code on any platform and framework.

Have you wondered what options GitHub Copilot can provide for helping to not only write your code, but test your code? In this session, we'll examine some key ways that Copilot can support you in ensuring you have the basic testing needs covered. In particular, we'll cover:

• A quick overview of GitHub Copilot
• Letting Copilot tell you how to get started testing for a new language
• Creating tests for existing code through one-step commands
• Creating tests for existing code with comments
• Creating tests for existing code with explicit prompts
• Validating inputs to functions using Copilot
• Using Copilot to build out tests for edge cases
• Leveraging testing frameworks
• Building tests before the code - TDD with Copilot

HuggingFace.co is the premier site for all things around large language models (LLMs). It has free and open source models and datasets to easily access, download and start working with. As well, it provides the well-known Transformers library of functions that you can use with Python to code up quick and simple apps that interface with LLMs for chatbots, sentiment analysis, classification, etc. And it also allows for direct access to use some models with no coding necessary.

Join expert Brent Laster for an exploration of the site and learn how to navigate it and use its many features. We'll also see how to use its models and the Transformers library with simple Python coding to do typical LLM interactions.

In this workshop, we'll focus on how DevOps engineers can leverage GitHub Copilot for typical DevOps tasks, simply and easily. We'll discuss how Copilot Chat can be used to drive creating specifications and infrastructure for use with Docker, GitHub Actions, Terraform, and Kubernetes.

By the end of the workshop, participants will understand where, when, and how GitHub Copilot can be used to accelerate being productive with these DevOps apps.

Join speaker, author, and former DevOps director Brent Laster for a fast-paced, hands-on session to understand how you can put GitHub Copilot's AI capabilities to work in common DevOps scenarios. With only a GitHub id and a browser, you'll be able to leverage a full IDE environment in GitHub Codespaces without installing anything on your own system. Each lab will focus on a different technology and guide you through creating simple examples that you can extrapolate to larger, production efforts.

You'll need to bring a laptop and already have an account and access to the public GitHub.com to do the labs.

We look forward to seeing you in the workshop!

Just as CI/CD and other revolutions in DevOps have changed the landscape of the software development lifecycle (SDLC), so Generative AI is now changing it again. Gen AI has the potential to simplify, clarify, and lessen the cycles required across multiple phases of the SDLC.

In this session with author, trainer, and experienced DevOps director Brent Laster, we'll survey the ways that today's AI assistants and tools can be incorporated across your SDLC phases including planning, development, testing, documentation, maintaining, etc. There are multiple ways the existing tools can help us beyond just the standard day-to-day coding and, like other changes that have happened over the years, teams need to be aware of, and thinking about how to incorporate AI into their processes to stay relevant and up-to-date.

Just as CI/CD and other revolutions in DevOps have changed the landscape of the software development lifecycle (SDLC), so Generative AI is now changing it again. Gen AI has the potential to simplify, clarify, and lessen the cycles required across multiple phases of the SDLC.

In this session with author, trainer, and experienced DevOps director Brent Laster, we'll survey the ways that today's AI assistants and tools can be incorporated across your SDLC phases including planning, development, testing, documentation, maintaining, etc. There are multiple ways the existing tools can help us beyond just the standard day-to-day coding and, like other changes that have happened over the years, teams need to be aware of, and thinking about how to incorporate AI into their processes to stay relevant and up-to-date.

Security is a fundamental concern and requirement in all aspects of software development today. And GitHub is the industry-leading collaboration platform for software development. So, it’s crucial that anyone working with/in GitHub understands how to use it securely.

Join expert technologist, trainer and author Brent Laster to survey and learn to use the controls, policies, and automation that GitHub makes available to work securely in its platform. Learn about managing access, dealing with vulnerabilities in your code or dependencies, preventing sensitive data from getting into your repositories, automatically creating needed security updates, and more! This will be a hands-on workshop so you get real experience working with the mechanisms in GitHub. All you need is a GitHub userid and a browser!

Security must be top of mind as you work in GitHub whether you are working in the public site or in an enterprise instance. As the industry leading platform for development and collaboration, GitHub provides a wide variety of security features and options.

But without understanding them, it is very easy to work in GitHub in an insecure way and expose your code and other assets to vulnerabilities. It's also necessary to be able to respond to security issues that arise outside of your control - in your dependencies, in hacking attempts, and in accidental misuse as others collaborate with you. This workshop will provide you with the insight and understanding you need to be able to work in GitHub securely.

Part 1: Introduction and Overview

Topics include:

• Welcome
• Workshop overview and setup
• Importance of having and managing security in GitHub

Part 2: Protecting your access

Topics include:

• How GitHub approaches security - user vs repositories
• Securing access with tokens and keys

Hands-on lab: Securing your account - managing authentication with fine-grained personal access tokens

Part 3: Protecting your repositories

Topics include:

• Understanding repo security risks
• Best practices for securing repos
• Using branch protection and rulesets

Hands-on lab: Setting up branch protection and rulesets and trying it out

Part 4: Protecting your code

Topics include:

• GitHub's Advanced Security offering
• Scanning for vulnerabilities with CodeQL

Hands-on lab: Setting up CodeQL and responding to issues

Part 5: Protecting your credentials

Topics include

• What secrets are in GitHub
• Setting up and using secrets scanning
• Responding to secrets scanning alerts

Hands-on lab: Setting up secret scanning for your repos and responding to alerts

Part 6: Protecting your dependencies

Topics include

• Code scanning and dependency vulnerability assessments
• Setting up and using Dependabot for automated dependency updates

Hands-on lab: Using Dependabot to manage your dependency vulnerabilties and updates

Wrap-up and other security topics (as time allows)

In this presentation, we'll cover some of the latest developments and feature additions in GitHub Copilot as rolled out in recent months and at GitHub Universe. Join author, trainer, technologist, and author of the upcoming book “Learning GitHub Copilot” from O'Reilly, Brent Laster to learn what's new and exciting with this popular generative AI tool!

GitHub Copilot continues to evolve as a popular AI coding assistant, adding features and functionality regularly. But there are more significant changes that have been rolled out recently, including wider Copilot integration in the individual GitHub plan for things like indexing repos, pull request and issue summaries. Also, there's new functionality for reviewing code, agent edits, vision features, giving Copilot custom instructions that will apply to every chat, and more!