Keeps starting me over but most exercises are already pre-filled

I was doing the HTML/CSS/JavaScript course, and sometimes I can’t do it in the same day or week, but when I come back, it starts me over at the beginning but with most of the “pages” already having the code completed, meaning I have to click “Submit test” or finish the code even though I’ve already done it… and I’m seeing no way to just continue where I left off.

There are two different types of saved progress for Free Code Camp: your profile and your browser cache.

Your completed challenges are all saved to your account in the FCC database. You can see the list of completed challenges and also the last submitted solutions by looking at your profile page.

Your progress tracking (map) is saved in your browser’s local storage. In-progress code is also saved in your local browser cache. If you are changing browsers or clearing your cache regularly you’ll have to use freecodecamp.com/map to navigate to your next challenge. Especially as you get to more complicated challenges that may take multiple sessions, I strongly recommend saving your in-progress work outside of the browser cache. This is a good opportunity to learn the ins and outs of your GitHub account, but you can also just save locally or use a service like repl.it which allows for versioning.

It sounds as though whatever automatic browser cleanup you have going on is resulting in you losing the cached data that tells the browser the last challenge you were on, but the cached solutions are still present. When this happens, just use the map to jump to your last challenge.

OK, so since the updated curriculum, finished lessons show green checkmarks next to them… but going through each finished lesson, none of the finished code I did in them is there, it’s reset. So, the freecodecamp.com/map you mention just redirects to https://learn.freecodecamp.org/, which is where the green checkmarks show, so it doesn’t make sense that it’s stored in my browser cache if that’s still there but all of the finished lesson code is gone (and it did populate weeks ago when I was reviewing with someone).

So, is there an updated explanation of how this is supposed to work? I’m not having trouble with lessons being remembered as finished, just the finished code re-populating when I go into a lesson to quickly review for my upcoming projects.

Update since the new curriculum changes this spring:

There are two different types of saved progress for Free Code Camp: your profile and your browser cache.

A list of your completed challenges is saved to your account in the FCC database. You can see the list of completed challenges by looking at your public portfolio. With a growing curriculum already over 1,400 lessons and a growing user base several times that size, FCC does not store every solution to every challenge in its database. When you complete a challenge, there is a popup that gives you the option to download your solution. This gives you the option to save copy of any solution that you may want to reference later. There are some challenges which are classified as projects required for certifications. Your solutions to those can be viewed on your settings page.

Your in-editor code is saved in your browser’s local storage. Recent in-progress code from the challenge editor is also saved in your local browser cache when you run tests. Because FCC rolled out a completely new application, the old cached values are no longer valid. This is the same effect you would have if you cleared your browser cache. If you are completing lessons and do not see your recent code, then something is preventing FCC from writing to your browser’s storage. This could be a browser setting, a privacy extension, or a browser version incompatibility. Especially as you get to more complicated challenges that may take multiple sessions, I strongly recommend saving your in-progress work outside of the browser cache.

This is a good opportunity to learn the ins and outs of your GitHub account, but you can also just save locally or use a service like repl.it which allows for versioning.

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Blockquote FCC does not store every solution to every challenge in its database
It never needed to store every user’s solutions to the database… it already auto-formats the solution when you submit it, and the proof of this is that, at least in the cases of lessons that rely on solutions from the previous lesson, whatever you typed previously (regardless of tab/space/newline formatting), is just overwritten with the solution from the previous lesson.

This means that FCC can store the solution for every lesson without needing to store every user’s solution… does that make sense?

That’s what I’m looking for… the actual solutions after I’ve completed the lessons so I can review them while doing projects or otherwise. Right now I’m mentoring someone using FCC and it’s hard to say… “Uh, yah those previous lessons that says are completed and had their solutions auto-formatted for you… they’re gone, and now we’ll be doing Google searches or checking W3Schools or MDN for things we can’t quite remember how to do exactly but that we did in FCC…”

This of course opens up the possibility that new students see other sources of free education early on and and may be a little dismayed at FCC.

If you don’t need your own solutions, click the “get a hint” button to see the Guide entry for it.