Optional developer deep dives
Extra practice after the core workshop.
What is source curation?
Understand the concept and its role in your development work.
What it is
Source curation is selecting, checking, and organising the material used to answer a question. A source is the document or excerpt; its authority and version determine how much weight it should carry.
Why it matters
An inherited project often contains old guides, current contracts, and proposed features together. Without curation, a plausible answer can describe the wrong version of the system.
What is a source-backed system explanation?
Understand the concept and its role in your development work.
What it is
It is an account of how a system works in which each technical claim can be traced to evidence. A citation points to evidence; verification checks that the evidence supports the exact claim.
Why it matters
During onboarding or a code review, an incorrect assumption about permissions or data flow can lead to a wrong implementation. Traceable explanations let another developer check your reasoning.
What is evidence-led incident triage?
Understand the concept and its role in your development work.
What it is
Triage is the first structured investigation of a problem: record observations, compare them with expected behaviour, and choose the next check. A hypothesis is a possible explanation; it is not yet a verified cause.
Why it matters
A generic “submission failed” message hides useful detail. Developers can narrow the problem faster by examining the request and response before changing code.
What does it mean to ground an answer?
Understand the concept and its role in your development work.
What it is
Grounding connects a response to supplied evidence. Here, the approved reference guide is included in the model’s context. A source ID identifies a reference; it does not prove the response used that reference correctly.
Why it matters
A model’s general knowledge does not establish your project’s current rules. Developers need to constrain project-specific answers and identify claims that exceed the evidence.
What is a structured response?
Understand the concept and its role in your development work.
What it is
A structured response follows a defined shape, such as a JSON object. A schema specifies fields and types. Validation checks whether the result satisfies the schema and the application’s rules.
Why it matters
A UI needs reliable fields for the answer, sources, and next step. Free-form prose is harder to process, but well-formed JSON can still contain an incorrect answer.
What is API integration?
Understand the concept and its role in your development work.
What it is
API integration connects components through requests and responses. The browser handles interaction; the server controls credentials and assembles the Gemini request. Responses may represent success or a service failure.
Why it matters
An assistant can fail even when its prompt is good. Developers must protect credentials, validate input and output, and prevent service errors from becoming misleading answers.