A Rapid Workflow for Publishing CS Teaching Materials

Russell Gordon
Lakefield College School

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Motivation

Avoid fiddling with GUI-based page layout, slides, and diagramming software.

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Motivation

Satisfy 80/20 rule.

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Motivation

Meet the needs of English language learners.

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Benefits

Syntax-highlighted code blocks for most languages.

# Greet the world using a function in Python
def hello_world():
  return "Hello, world!"

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Benefits

Math notation using LaTeX: single-line.

$x=\frac{-b\pm \sqrt{b^2-4ac}}{2a}$

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Benefits

Math notation using LaTeX: multi-line.

$\begin{array}{rl}a& =-0.25\\ b& =2\\ c& =1.5\end{array}$

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Benefits

Inline math notation using LaTeX:

Videos take at least $3x$ units of time to author where $x$ is the length of the video in question.

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Benefits

Mermaid: left-right flowchart.

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Benefits

Mermaid: top-down flowchart.

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Benefits

Mermaid: sequence diagram.

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Benefits

Mermaid: class diagram.

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Benefits

Mermaid: state diagram.

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Benefits

Mermaid: entity-relationship diagram.

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Benefits

Mermaid: user journey diagrams.

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Benefits

Mermaid: Gantt charts.

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Benefits

Mermaid: pie charts.

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Benefits

Mermaid: git graph diagrams.

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Benefits

Add images quickly by drag and drop.

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Benefits

Use animations to convey key concepts without distraction.

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Benefits

Focus on content, not presentation, by writing in Markdown.

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Benefits

Your data is stored in plain text files – less potential for lock-in.

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Benefits

Link quickly to existing content.

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Benefits

Publish a searchable site.

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Benefits

Free hosting (at Netlify or Vercel).

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Drawbacks

Dependencies on:

• Obsidian
• Digital Garden plugin.
• GitHub
• Netlify or Vercel

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Personal Conclusion

Benefits outweigh potential for software failure.

Better than manually writing HTML, using a word processor, or a proprietary content management system.