I think this type of course should come very early in a CS program. Yes, many students learn these things on their own, but many don’t, and it’s a good idea to put them on equal footing.
Being able to efficiently use common software tools allows students to learn more effectively in other courses, so a class like this provides a leverage to the other classes. Yes a lot of CS is theory, but it’s pretty hard to learn about that without having a solid grasp of the tools.
Agreed. At my undergraduate we didn't have an equivalent, and a common complaint amongst the TA's was how little concrete devops skills the students had. One of my friends TAing a second year course even went so far as to say almost all of his time in office hours was (watching students fail to do, and then) showing students the basics.
Being able to efficiently use common software tools allows students to learn more effectively in other courses, so a class like this provides a leverage to the other classes. Yes a lot of CS is theory, but it’s pretty hard to learn about that without having a solid grasp of the tools.