Enable code scanning and secure your code with CodeQL.
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Enable code scanning and secure your code with CodeQL.
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# Enable CodeQL to secure your source code
_Ensuring the security of application source code is a critical step in modern software development. In this GitHub Skills course, you will learn to use GitHub code scanning to identify, resolve, and prevent insecure coding patterns._
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## Welcome
_Welcome to "Introduction to CodeQL"! :wave:_
In this course, we will explore using GitHub code scanning, powered by [CodeQL](https://codeql.github.com/), to identify common coding practices that can lead to security vulnerabilities. During this course, we will enable code scanning on your repository to identify, remediate, and prevent vulnerabilities.
  
Code scanning is part of the [GitHub Advanced Security (GHAS)](https://docs.github.com/en/get-started/learning-about-github/about-github-advanced-security) product suite. All of the features of Advanced Security are 100% free for open source, public repositories.
- **Who is this for**: Developers, security engineers, open source maintainers.
- **What you'll learn**: We'll show you how to enable code scanning and identify SQL injection vulnerabilities with CodeQL.
- **What you'll build**: A secure software development pipeline that allows you to identify and prevent new security vulnerabilities from being introduced into your production code.
- **Prerequisites**: In this course, you'll need a baseline knowledge of GitHub concepts such as pull requests, GitHub Actions, and source code. You'll also need to be familiar with the concepts of Static Application Security Testing (SAST). Don't worry, we'll demistify the complex parts for you 🙂.
- **How long**: This course is four steps long and takes less than 30 minutes to complete.
## How to start this course
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1. Right-click **Start course** and open the link in a new tab.
2. In the new tab, most of the prompts will automatically fill in for you.
   - For owner, choose your personal account or an organization to host the repository.
   - We recommend creating a public repository, as private repositories will [use Actions minutes](https://docs.github.com/en/billing/managing-billing-for-github-actions/about-billing-for-github-actions).
   - Scroll down and click the **Create repository** button at the bottom of the form.
3. After your new repository is created, wait about 20 seconds, then refresh the page. Follow the step-by-step instructions in the new repository's README.
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Get help: [Post in our discussion board](https://github.com/orgs/skills/discussions/categories/introduction-to-codeql) &bull; [Review the GitHub status page](https://www.githubstatus.com/)
&copy; 2023 GitHub &bull; [Code of Conduct](https://www.contributor-covenant.org/version/2/1/code_of_conduct/code_of_conduct.md) &bull; [MIT License](https://gh.io/mit)
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