Learn Python, for fun and profit

This document repository introduces you to Python programming. Most people have fun in learning Python and they can make big profit if they have big fun: programming teachs you how to think.

Unlike most textbooks or tutorials, we write this document with an important principle: teaching the professional way of Python programming. "Professional" means the best practices in Python programming used by professional programmers. Following is a short list of best practices we follow in this document:

• Design with test cases before coding.
• Follow the PEP 8 - Style Guide for Python Code and use VS Code PyLint tool to enforce the style.
• No magic numbers.
• Short functions/methods.
• Design, code, test and debug incrementally.
• Refactoring is part of development.

All lecture videos are in Youtube PlayLists.

The followin is table of content. It is organzied based on topics, not on a textbook chpater order. As a program, you count from 0:

Section 0: Setup

• Command Line Interface: introduction of command line tool. Please read and learn this first if you don't know CLI. It is must-to-know for a programmer.
• Install Python Interpreter: how to install Python.
• Install and setup VS Code for Python Development: how to install and setup Visual Studo Code (VS Code) for Python development.
• Git and GitHub: use GitHub to manage your software source code. YouTube Video: GitHub and GitHub.

Section 1: Introduction to Programming

• Introduction: how a computer runs programs, programming languages, compiler and interpreter. YouTube Video: Introduction to Programming.
• Program Design: the software development life cycle, flowcharts and pseudo-code.
• Getting Started with Python in VS Code: develop and run Pythin programs using VS Code. YouTube Video: Python in VS Code.

Section 2: Basic Concepts and Operations

• Hello World: Using print to say "hello world" and learn string and comment. YouTube Video: Hello World.
• Variable Declaration and Naming: variable assignment and its naming conventions. YouTube Video: variable assignment naming.
• Types and Operations: data types and operations. YouTube Video: Types and Operations
• Reading Input: reading input of different types. YouTube Video: Reading Input
• F-string: format string literals in different ways. YouTube Video: Formatted String
• Code demo: Turtle Graphics: introduce the built-in turtle module.

Section 3: Decision Structure

• Boolean Expression: introduce the control structure concepts and Boolean expressions. YouTube Video.
• Decision Structure: introduce the decision structure of if, else and elif. It also covers the important concept of code block. YouTube Video.
• Code demo: Hit the target

Section 4: Repetition Structure

• While Loop: the while loop and infinite loop. YouTube Video.
• For Loop: sequence of data times and for loop. YouTube Video.
• Continue and Break: the continue and break statement. YouTube Video.
• Code demo: Factorial and Spiral Circle

Section 5: Functions

• Function Concepts: function concept, definition and call. YouTube Video
• main and Scope: the main function and variable scopes. YouTube Video
• Module: module concepts and built-in modules. YouTube Video
• Code demo: Hit the target

Section 6: Files

• Read and Write: read and write files. YouTube Video.
• Record and Operation: record and other file operations. YouTube Video.

Section 7: Exceptions

• Errors and Exceptions: program errors and exceptions. YouTube Video.
• Handling Exception: handling program exception. YouTube Video.

Section 8: List and Tuple

• List Note
• Tuple Note
• Lists Youtube Video

Section 9: Dictionary and Set

• Dictionary Note
• Dictionary Youtube Video
• Set Youtube Video

Section: Advanced Topics

• Lambda Function Note

• Lamda Function Video

• Data Visualization Note

• Data Science Note

• Mutablity Note

• Class and Object Note

• Classes and Objects YouTube Videos

  • Part1
  • Part2

Summary