Cornell Astronomy 2022 REU - Python Workshop

Welcome to the GitHub repository for the Cornell Astronomy Summer 2022 Python workshop! Much of this is reused with generous permission from the 2020 and 2021 REU Python Workshops, located here and here.

Conveners:

	Info
Dates and time	Tuesday, 14th June 2021 / 10:00 - Noon
	Thursday, 16th June 2021 / 10:00 - Noon

Description

Our goal is to provide an introduction and overview of the Python programming language and ecosystem, including the base python language features and some libraries which are widely used both inside and outside of astronomy.

We will be using jupyter notebooks throughout, which are a great tool to interactively write python code, and easily do things such as plotting and visualization all in one place.

We have some info on installing python, along with an introductory jupyter notebook to cover some basics, which are linked in the 'Before the Workshop' section below. Along with these introductory concepts, we will introduce you to:

• The python ecosystem, and jupyter notebooks.
• The basic libraries of numerical and scientific computing, NumPy and SciPy.
• How to visualize and plot data using matplotlib
• Libraries for easily working with data, such as Pandas.

We hope for this workshop to be a springboard from which you can learn much more about python, programming and working with software in astronomy and the sciences.

Learning Objectives

• Gain awareness of Jupyter notebook - a tool that can help you organize research notes and code in one place.
• Obtain basic proficiency in popular python packages frequently used in astronomy research.

Agenda

Part 1

• Introduction to the Anaconda + Python + Jupiter ecosystem.
• Use Google Colab to attain basic familiarity with Python syntax and features.
• notebook: 'CrashCourseInPython.ipynb' (Google Colab version)

Part 2

• Introduction to NumPy.
• notebook: part2.ipynb (Google Colab version)

Part 3

• Introduction to a few more major scientific computing libraries:
  • matplotlib
  • scipy
  • astropy
  • sympy
• part3.ipynb or the Google Colab version

Part 4

• Setting up local environment (if not done yet)
• Working from the command line
• Anaconda
• Goal: run the script here on your local computer.

Before the workshop

If you would like to follow along interactively during the workshop, please do the following before the course starts:

• Download and install Anaconda (official installation instructions are here). Use the latest version of Python 3 and be sure to check the box that says "Add Anaconda to my PATH environment variable" if on Windows.

• If you have never programmed before feel free to go through the notebook CrashCourseInPython.ipynb in the 'intro' folder. It will help you review the basic functionalities and concepts within Python. We will go over it quickly as the first part of the workshop.
• The CrashCourseInPython.ipynb file is a Jupyter notebook: an open-source web application that allows one to create and share documents that contain live code, equations, visualizations and narrative text. It comes pre-installed with package distributions like Anaconda. However, if you don't have access to Jupyter/Python on your computer (or run into issues installing Anaconda/Python), you can find an online interactive version of the notebook [here](Google Colab version)! You can click on "copy to drive" to be able to edit and run the notebook.

After the workshop

Further reading

• Resources list
• Last year's curriculum