The Modern Software Developer (Elective)

reading · we frame, you read MIT or the canonical taught · we author, no canonical fits ↺ spirals back to earlier lessons

Course locked

Complete Ethics, Society, and Professional Responsibility first.

This course unlocks once you've finished its prerequisite. Open prerequisite →

reading · 30 min + ~138 min canonical

The New Way to Build: AI Copilots, Agents, and What Actually Changed

You are learning to program at a moment when how programming is done is changing faster than at any point since the move from assembly to high-level languages — and this course is…

primary Stanford CS146S The Modern Software Developer

preview →

reading · 35 min + ~138 min canonical L1

How Coding Agents Work: Tool Use, Multi-Step Reasoning, and the Agent Loop

An autonomous coding agent can feel like magic: you describe a feature, and it reads your codebase, writes the code, runs the tests, sees a failure, fixes it, and reports back — g…

primary Stanford CS146S The Modern Software Developer

after L1 locked

reading · 35 min + ~138 min canonical L1

Context Is Everything: Context Engineering and the Model Context Protocol (MCP)

Here is the single most important practical truth about working with AI tools, the one that separates people who get mediocre results from those who get excellent ones: a language…

primary Stanford CS146S The Modern Software Developer

after L2 locked

reading · 35 min + ~138 min canonical L1

AI Across the Lifecycle: Testing, Security, Review, and Debugging

AI-assisted development is not only about writing code — arguably its bigger impact is across the rest of the software lifecycle: generating tests, scanning for security holes, re…

primary Stanford CS146S The Modern Software Developer

after L3 locked

reading · 35 min + ~138 min canonical L1

The Verification Imperative: Managing AI-Generated Code, Craft, and Ethics

Everything in this course has pointed toward a single discipline, and this final lesson names it and makes it central: the verification imperative — the non-negotiable professiona…

primary Stanford CS146S The Modern Software Developer

after L4 locked

exercise reading · 15 min L1

Exercises: Easy (Warm-up)

- [ ] Set up Claude Code or Cursor for a Ruby project and complete 3 coding tasks using AI assistance; document what worked and what didn't - [ ] Write 5 different system prompts …

after L5 locked

exercise reading · 30 min L1

Exercises: Medium (Core)

- [ ] Build a simple MCP server in Ruby or TypeScript that exposes a useful tool (e.g., database query, file search, test runner) and connect it to an AI assistant - [ ] AI code r…

after L6 locked

exercise reading · 45 min L1

Exercises: Hard (Stretch)

- [ ] Build an autonomous coding agent that can complete a multi-step task (e.g., add a CRUD feature to a Rails app including model, migration, controller, views, and tests) with …

after L7 locked

exercise reading · 60 min L1

Mini-Project

- [ ] AI-augmented development report — Complete a meaningful feature in a Rails app using AI-assisted development throughout. Document: which tasks AI helped with, which it could…

after L8 locked

L10

project reading · 360 min L1

Project: MCP-Powered Development Tool

Build an MCP server in Ruby that exposes your Rails application's schema, routes, and test results as tools for an AI coding assistant. Demonstrate by having the AI implement a co…

after L9 locked

L11

assessment reading · 42 min L1

Self-Assessment: The Modern Software Developer (Elective)

- [ ] What is the Model Context Protocol (MCP)? What problem does it solve and how does it work? - [ ] What is a coding agent? How does it differ from an autocomplete copilot? Wha…

after L10 locked

L12

assessment reading · 60 min L1

Quarter 12 Gate Check: Security, Graphics, and Ethics

- [ ] Course 12.1 knowledge check passed - [ ] Course 12.2 knowledge check passed - [ ] Course 12.3 knowledge check passed (if taken) - [ ] Course 12.4 knowledge check passed - [ …

after L11 locked

L13

assessment reading · 120 min L1

Year 3 Assessment: Applied Systems

Complete all of the following:

after L12 locked

13 lessons. Read in order; spiral back when you need to. By the end you'll have used the core ideas twice — once on the abstract, once on something you'll meet at work next week.