After the Workshop
The workshop is over, but your codespace, your repo, and your API key all keep working for a while. This page covers the three things people ask most: whether your codespace will disappear, how to save your work so it doesn’t, and how to keep coding on your own with the same setup you used here.
Do these now
Before you close the laptop on the last day:
- Push your work to GitHub so nothing is lost
- Save your API key somewhere you’ll still have it in a few months
- Skim the rest of this page so you know how to come back
Will my codespace disappear?
Eventually, yes. A codespace you stop using is deleted automatically after 30 days of inactivity. Stopping a codespace is not the same as losing it: when you stop one, everything you saved is still there the next time you open it. It is deletion that loses things, and the only work that survives deletion is work you have pushed to GitHub.
There are also usage limits on a free GitHub account: 120 core-hours and 15 GB of storage per month, included at no cost. A core-hour is one hour on a one-core machine, so the default two-core codespace uses two core-hours for every hour it is running. That is roughly 60 hours of active use a month before you would need to pay. Stopping your codespace when you are done for the day keeps you well under the limit.
The practical takeaway: don’t rely on a codespace as the only place your work lives. Push it to GitHub, and the codespace becomes disposable.
How do I save my work?
Saving a file in the editor keeps it inside the codespace. To save it somewhere permanent, you commit the change and push it to GitHub. Once it is on GitHub, you can delete the codespace and recreate it later with all your work intact.
The fast way: one line in the terminal
In the terminal, paste this and press Enter:
git add -A && git commit -m "save my work" && git pushThat one line does all three steps at once: it gathers up every file you have changed (including brand-new ones), records them as a save point, and sends them to GitHub. If you have not changed anything since your last save, it simply says “nothing to commit” and stops, which is fine.
Run it whenever you want to save, for example at the end of a session or after finishing an exercise. It is worth keeping the line somewhere handy so you can paste it again next time.
If you would rather not use the terminal at all, you can also ask Pi: “commit my work and push it to GitHub.” It runs the same steps for you.
Confirm it actually worked
Pushing silently is a common worry, so check it:
- In the editor, the Source Control panel should show no pending changes, and the branch name in the bottom status bar should no longer have a number next to it waiting to be sent.
- In your browser, open your repo on github.com and refresh. Your changed files should show your commit message and a timestamp like “1 minute ago” at the top of the file list.
When the timestamp on github.com matches what you just did, your work is safe even if the codespace is later deleted.
Save your API key
Your OpenRouter key keeps working after the workshop, so hold onto it. If you have lost track of it, run /key in the workshop Discord and the bot will show it to you again.
Put a copy somewhere you will still have access to in a few months:
- email it to yourself with a subject line you will search for later, or
- save it in a password manager.
How long it lasts: each key has a $1.50 per day spending limit, and we keep the keys funded as long as the budget holds out. They will be switched off when the next workshop begins, which is expected to be around six months from now. We can’t promise the budget lasts that whole time, so treat the key as a nice bonus rather than something permanent, and don’t build anything on it that you can’t afford to lose access to.
Keep coding on your own
You already have your own copy of the workshop environment: the repo you created from the template during Get Started. That copy is yours to keep using.
Pick up where you left off
To continue the workshop exercises or anything else in that repo, reopen it as a codespace. Go to github.com/codespaces and start your existing codespace if it is still there, or open your repo on github.com, click the green Code button, and create a fresh codespace on it. Your API key is already stored as a secret on that repo, so a new codespace will have it from the start.
Start a new project
For something separate from the workshop, make another repo from the template the same way you did the first time: open the participant environment template, click Use this template, and create a new repository. Then add your API key as a Codespaces secret on the new repo (the Get Started guide walks through both steps with screenshots) and launch a codespace. You will have the same R, Quarto, and Pi setup you used all week, pointed at a clean project.
Use VSCode on your own computer
The browser editor and the desktop version of VSCode are the same program. If you would rather work in a window on your own machine, you have a few options. They differ in how much runs in the cloud versus on your laptop, and in how much you have to install yourself.
Local editor, still on a codespace
This is the smallest change. Install VSCode on your computer and add the GitHub Codespaces extension. Sign in with your GitHub account and you can open your existing codespace straight from the desktop app. The editor runs locally, but your code, the installed packages, and your API key all still live in the cloud codespace, so there is nothing to install on the dependency side and this still uses your monthly codespace hours.
Run everything locally with Docker
To stop using codespaces but keep the same setup, run the workshop container on your own machine. Install VSCode, its Dev Containers extension, and Docker Desktop. Clone your repo, open it in VSCode, and choose Reopen in Container. VSCode reads the .devcontainer folder in your repo and builds the same image you used all week, with R, the tidyverse, Quarto, and the Pi and Claude Code tools already installed. This uses no codespace hours and works offline once it is built, though the image is large and the first build is slow, so give it a good connection and some free disk space. You supply your API key yourself this time rather than through a Codespaces secret: set it as an OPENROUTER_API_KEY environment variable, and ask Pi or a TA if you get stuck wiring it in.
Install everything by hand
The most control and the most upkeep. Instead of a container you install each piece directly: R, Quarto, VSCode with its R and Quarto extensions, and Node.js if you want the Pi and Claude Code agents (both install with npm). Then you manage the R packages yourself. The workshop uses the tidyverse plus a handful of others; install them in R with:
install.packages(c("tidyverse", "here", "janitor", "gt", "palmerpenguins",
"ggbeeswarm", "gtsummary", "ggpubr", "patchwork",
"broom.helpers"))Going this way means keeping R, Quarto, and those packages up to date yourself as versions change. It pays off if you work offline often or want a permanent local setup, but the Docker route gets you the same environment with far less maintenance.
Where to get help
The workshop Discord stays open. Post questions there, and have a look at the Resources page for references on R, the tidyverse, and working with coding assistants.