quick_start.qmd

---
title: "Quick start"
---

# Quick start

## Julia

ConScape is a library for the [Julia programming language](https://julialang.org/) ([Why Julia?](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julia_(programming_language))).

\note{While it certainly is inconvenient to use an unfamiliar programming language, Julia is similar to other programming languages like R or python. Hence, using the notebooks provided here will get anybody with a background in other programming languages started right away. For a [comparison between Julia and R](https://datascience-enthusiast.com/R/R_Julia_cheat_sheet.html) for basic matrix and vector notations.}


### Installation

Julia can be downloaded [here](https://julialang.org/downloads/)

::: {.callout-warning}
ConScape requires a julia version **≥ 1.6**
:::

A nice youtube tutorial on the installation of Julia and the integrated development environment VS Code:

[![YT thumbnail](https://img.youtube.com/vi/oi5dZxPGNlk/0.jpg)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oi5dZxPGNlk)


### Running

There are several integrated development environments for Julia, we use VS Code ourselves (which is easy to set up and use as shown [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oi5dZxPGNlk)).

For R users, it seems that the Rstudio team is working on a multi language environment that also would support Julia. We will follow this with great interest.


## Installation ConScape

To install ConScape from Julia's package manager:

```julia-repl
(v1.6) pkg> add ConScape
```

or easier, directly from Julia:

```julia-repl
julia> using Pkg
julia> Add.pkg("ConScape")
julia> using ConScape
```

## From here...

Now you are ready to start with the first [notebook](/notebooks/nbk_getting_started.qmd) presenting a basic workflow for connectivity analysis using ConScape.