Set up the Codex app, learn what makes an agent different from a chat, and direct it to build a website — which you publish to a real internet address before the day ends.
Install the Codex app, connect your subscription, and direct an agent through one complete piece of work: a personal website, built to your description and published at a live URL.
You need: a Windows or Mac laptop · a bank card for the $20/month subscription · about 90 minutes.
Create an OpenAI account
Open chatgpt.com and sign up with a personal email you check daily. This account is your identity for the whole course.
Step done when: you see the ChatGPT chat screen while signed in.
Subscribe to Plus ($20/month)
In ChatGPT: Settings → Upgrade plan → Plus. This subscription is the single required cost of the course. It powers the Codex agent you install today and a second agent, Hermes, that we add in week 2 — both run on this one plan, with a usage allowance of roughly 15–80 agent messages per 5-hour window.
Step done when: your plan says “Plus” and chatgpt.com/codex opens without asking you to upgrade.
Install the Codex app
Codex installs like any normal application, in either of two ways: from the Microsoft Store (search “Codex”, publisher OpenAI), or as a direct download from the official page developers.openai.com/codex/app — it has builds for both Windows and Mac.
Download the Codex app from developers.openai.com/codex/app, open the downloaded file, and drag Codex into Applications. Everything else today is identical.
Step done when: the Codex app opens to a welcome screen.
Sign in and say hello
In the Codex app, choose Sign in with ChatGPT — your browser opens, you approve, and the app connects to your subscription. Then start a new thread and type a short message.
Step done when: Codex answers you in a thread. Setup is finished — you never repeat Block A again.
You already use AI that talks. Codex is AI that works: it creates real files on your machine, runs them, examines the result, and corrects itself. A chat gives you a recipe; an agent cooks. The skill you build in this course is directing that work — precisely and calmly.
Click each card: is this a job for a chat or for an agent? Rule of thumb — if the result must still exist on the computer after the conversation ends, it's agent work.
Four stations, in this order, every time. Each day of this course runs the pipeline on something bigger; today it's a website. (Later you'll meet agentic loops — a different concept; the pipeline is your working method, not the agent's.)
Give Codex a workspace
Agents work inside one project folder at a time. In the Codex app: New thread → choose a project folder → create a new folder on your Desktop named my-site and select it. Everything Codex does today stays inside that folder.
Step done when: the thread shows my-site as its working folder.
Describe the site — watch a good request
Before you send anything, read one strong request. Notice what makes it work: a clear goal, a few concrete details, and a checkpoint before building. Directing an agent is close to ordinary clear speech — the same way you'd brief a capable colleague.
Now do the same in your thread — either type it your way or start from this:
Build a one-page personal website about me in this folder.
First ask me 3 questions about the content. After my answers, show me your plan in 4 short bullets and wait for my OK.
Rules: plain HTML and CSS only, no frameworks, everything stays in this folder. When finished, tell me exactly how to open the page.Step done when: you approved a plan and Codex reports the files are created.
Verify — look at what you ordered
Open the my-site folder on your Desktop and double-click index.html. Your browser shows the page. Check it against what you approved: your name, your details, the color you chose. Verification is a habit, not a ceremony — thirty seconds of actually looking.
Step done when: the page in your browser matches the plan you approved.
Revise — two rounds of changes
Ask for changes the same way you'd ask a colleague. After each one, refresh the browser and look.
Make the heading larger, add a section titled "Now learning: agentic engineering" with one sentence, and tell me what you changed.Step done when: you've made two changes of your own choosing and verified both.
Publish — put your site on the internet
Right now the site is a folder on your laptop, and only you can see it. Publishing means placing a copy of that folder on a hosting service — a computer that is always on and shows your pages to anyone who opens your address. We use Netlify: it's free, and the first publish is literally drag-and-drop.
my-site folder from your Desktop onto that rectangle — the folder itself, the one that directly contains index.html. The upload takes about 20 seconds..netlify.app. Click it: this is your site, on the internet. Open the same address on your phone to feel it properly.my-site instead.Drag the folder straight from Finder onto the Drop zone — identical otherwise.
Step done when: your site opens on your phone at its netlify.app address.
✦ This morning the site didn't exist. Now it has an address on the internet. That is one full pass of the pipeline: specify, delegate, verify, ship.
Make the site yours, publish the changes, and read one short article so tomorrow starts faster.
homework complete — mark the day done below
Tick when the homework above is finished — it syncs to your account.
Act on your computer: create and edit real files in a project folder, run them, inspect the results, and fix what it finds. The chat can only describe; the agent produces things that exist after the conversation ends.
Specify → delegate → verify → ship. Verify is yours: the agent reports “done”, but only you can confirm the result matches what you asked. Thirty seconds of looking, every time.
It copies your project folder to an always-on computer that serves it at a URL. Your laptop can sleep; the site stays up. Drag-and-drop is the simplest form — automatic publishing comes later in the course.