Exoscale Academy

Welcome to Exoscale Academy, the dedicated cloud education and training platform powered by Layer5. This repository provides a comprehensive framework for creating, organizing, and publishing structured learning paths, courses, and lessons tailored for Exoscale users and cloud practitioners.

Design Resources

To help you create professional and visually consistent content, this academy provides the official Exoscale Icons model for building custom architecture diagrams.

You can preview the full collection of icons anytime on the Meshery Catalog.

How to Use the Icons

1. Import the Model: Navigate to your Registry Settings in Meshery.
2. Select "Import from URL".
3. Paste the following URL to import the icon set:

   https://meshery.io/assets/modelsFiles/exoscale-icons.tar
   

Once imported, the individual Exoscale icons will be available in the Designer's shapes palette for you to use.

Table of Contents

• Prerequisites
• Getting Started
• Repository Structure
• Content Authoring Workflow
• Managing Assets: Images, Videos, and Embedded Designs
• Local Development
• Deploying & Going Live
• Contributing
• Site Framework
• License

Prerequisites

Before you begin, ensure you have:

• Hugo (extended version, recommended v0.147.9 or later)
• Go (v1.12 or later)

Getting Started

1. Clone the Repository

   git clone https://github.com/layer5io/exoscale-academy.git
   cd exoscale-academy

2. (Optional: If contributing from a fork)

   • Edit go.mod and update the module path to match your fork. Save and commit.

3. Organization UID

   • All Exoscale Academy content is namespaced under its Organization ID:

     1e2a8e46-937c-47ea-ab43-5716e3bcab2e
     

Repository Structure

layer5io-exoscale-academy/
├── README.md
├── LICENSE
├── go.mod, go.sum
├── hugo.yaml
├── Makefile, flake.nix, flake.lock, package.json, postcss.config.js
├── content/
│   └── en/
│       └── learning-paths/
│           └── 1e2a8e46-937c-47ea-ab43-5716e3bcab2e/
│               └── /
│                   └── /
│                       └── /
│                           └── content/
│                               └── .md
├── static/
│   └── 1e2a8e46-937c-47ea-ab43-5716e3bcab2e/
│       └── images/
├── layouts/
│   └── shortcodes/
│       └── 1e2a8e46-937c-47ea-ab43-5716e3bcab2e/
│           └── custom-org-shortcode.html
└── .github/
    └── ISSUE_TEMPLATE/, workflows/, config, etc.

Learning Path → Course → Chapter → Lesson is the core structure. Each level uses _index.md and lessons use .md files with Hugo frontmatter.

Content Authoring Workflow

1. Create Content

   • Authoring takes place inside:

     content/en/learning-paths/1e2a8e46-937c-47ea-ab43-5716e3bcab2e/
     

   • Structure:

     <learning-path>/
      <course>/
        <chapter>/
            content/
              lesson1.md
              lesson2.md
     

   • Frontmatter Required (example for any _index.md or lesson .md):

     ---
     title: "Title of Section or Lesson"
     description: "One-liner summary"
     weight: 10  # for menu order, lower numbers appear first
     ---

2. Delete Example Content

   • Remove any demo/example files not relevant to your new material.

3. Organize Lessons

   • Add new folders and markdown files for each learning path, course, chapter, and lesson.

Managing Assets: Images, Videos, and Embedded Designs

Enhance your courses with images and rich visual content. For compatibility with the Layer5 Academy’s multi-tenant architecture, do not use standard Markdown image links. Use shortcodes as described below.

How to Add an Image

1. Place your image (example: exoscale-logo.png) in the organization’s static directory:

   static/1e2a8e46-937c-47ea-ab43-5716e3bcab2e/images/exoscale-logo.png
   

2. In lesson markdown, embed your image using the usestatic shortcode (path is relative to your org’s folder):

   ![Exoscale Logo]({{</* usestatic path="images/exoscale-logo.png" */>}})

When you build the site, this shortcode automatically resolves to a working, tenant-aware asset path.

How to Add a Video

Embed videos in a visually distinct card using:

{{</* card title="Video: Example" */>}}
<video width="100%" height="100%" controls>
    <source src="https://example.com/your-video.mp4" type="video/mp4">
    Your browser does not support the video tag.
</video>
{{</* /card */>}}

How to Add a Meshery Design

1. Place Design Assets Put your design files (e.g., cdn.js, design YAMLs) alongside your course or lesson content, ideally following the same directory conventions used for images.

2. Embed Using the meshery-design-embed Shortcode In your lesson markdown, use:

{{< meshery-design-embed
id="embedded-design-0e3abb9c-39e7-4d09-b46f-26a0238c3c3d"
src="cdn.js"
>}}

• Replace id with the unique identifier for your design.
• Replace src with the path to your JS asset responsible for rendering.

Always use these shortcodes for images, videos, and embedded designs. This keeps assets portable, ensures they resolve correctly for each organization, and integrates properly with the Academy platform’s build and deployment flow.

Local Development

To preview your content locally, run:

hugo server

• Open the local URL displayed in your terminal browser.
• Local preview uses plain styling; full Layer5 Cloud branding is applied on production.

Deploying & Going Live

1. Commit and push your changes to a branch or main.
2. Contact Layer5 via Slack, email, or by opening a GitHub issue.
3. Provide your repository URL.
4. Once reviewed, a Layer5 admin will synchronize your content to the Layer5 Cloud Academy.

Contributing

• See Academy Docs for best practices on creating and publishing learning paths, courses, chapters, and challenges.
• Refer to CONTRIBUTING.md for branching, committing, and PR workflow.
• Review CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md and SECURITY.md prior to contributing.

Site Framework

• Stack: Built with Golang and Hugo, fully integrated with Layer5 Cloud.
• Theme & Template: Refer to academy-theme and academy-template for advanced customization.

License

Distributed under the Apache 2.0 License.

For questions or help, open a GitHub Issue or join the Layer5 Slack Community.

Happy Learning! The Layer5 & Exoscale Academy Team