Python for Beginners. A Smarter Way to Learn Python in 5 Days and Remember it Longer. With Easy Step by Step Guidance and Hands on Examples. (Python Crash Course-Programming for Beginners)

Python for Beginners

A smarter way to learn Python and remember it longer

Arthur T Brooks

Contents

INTRODUCTION

CHAPTER ONE

FIRST THINGS FIRST

CHAPTER TWO

VARIABLES AND VARIABLE RULES

CHAPTER THREE

STRINGS AND METHODS

CHAPTER FOUR

OPERATIONS WITH NUMBERS

CHAPTER FIVE

THE USE OF COMMENTS

CHAPTER SIX

OPERATIONS WITH LISTS

CHAPTER SEVEN

FURTHER OPERATIONS WITH LISTS

CHAPTER EIGHT

WORKING WITH LOOPS

CHAPTER NINE

WORKING WITH IF STATEMENTS

CHAPTER TEN

OPERATIONS INVOLVING DICTIONARIES

CHAPTER ELEVEN

NESTING DICTIONARIES AND LISTS

CHAPTER TWELVE

OPERATIONS INVOLVING USER INPUT AND WHILE LOOPS

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

OPERATIONS USING DEFINED FUNCTIONS

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

OPERATIONS INVOLVING CLASSES

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

OPERATING WITH FILES

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

MANAGING ERRORS WITH EXCEPTIONS

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

HOW EVERYTHING COMES TOGETHER IN PROJECTS

CONCLUSION

ANSWERS TO THE EXERCISES

INDEX

Copyright 2020 by Arthur T. Brooks - All rights reserved.

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INTRODUCTION

Python is one of the simplest programming languages in existence today. Although you may be trying to learn it for the first time, it is not necessarily that new. It was created in the 1980s by Guido van Rossum. Since then, notable companies like Yahoo, Facebook and Google have been using the language. Its advantage over other programming languages is its simplicity which the enables those who are venturing into programming for the first time to learn quickly and execute projects. Apart from this, highly experienced programmers also find the language handy in the daily practice of their art.

What this Book is for and What You Can Expect to Learn

This is a high quality, easy to understand, clear and concise non-technical, guidebook on how to learn Python in 5 days. You are not just going to learn how to code using Python, but how to understand actual Python itself. Apart from knowing Python code, you will be able to understand the way Python works which will enable you to use your creativity to achieve unlimited innovative tasks.

It is written in a manner that anyone, even a complete novice can learn and understand how to use Python in real-life situations. It is structured from the simplest and shortest operations, introducing the more advanced parts of the language only after you have become familiar with the basic concepts. At the end of the book, you will realize that you have, without any stressful self-exertion, become able to not only code in Python, but also think the way Python thinks.

How to Use this Book

If you follow this book faithfully, 5 days may even be too much time for you to spend for you to have a working knowledge of Python. However, we recommend that you follow the 5-day plan in order to maximize what you are learning by taking the extra time to properly digest the content. To make the most out of this book, study four chapters each day for the first three days, and three chapters each for the remaining two days. There are only eighteen chapters. Each chapter is short, straightforward and easy to understand, with examples to illustrate the lessons.

At the end of each chapter, there is a chapter summary which recaps what you have learned in that chapter. More importantly, there are exercises at the end of each chapter to enable you try your hand on what you have just learned and make it stick in your mind. The examples and exercises in this book are based on real-life work situations which will give you a solid foundation on which to build upon. These initial applications are designed to ease you in gently, giving you the confidence and knowledge to kickstart you in the world of programming.

Now this is not a book ‘about’ Python. Instead, it is a Python book. What is the difference? A book about Python will tell you a lot about Python and may be even explain just about everything that exists about Python. But you can finish a book about Python and not be able to use the language. On the contrary, this is a Python book which teaches you how to understand and use Python. That is the important difference. It is a practical manual for learning how to work in Python effectively. To help achieve this goal, it is strongly advised that you download Python 3 and the recommended text editor and install them on your system before proceeding to the rest of the book. How to do this is covered in chapter one of the book.

You learn Python and most other things in life by doing them. The essence of this guide is to enable you not just read along, but work along with the book. You can of course simply read the codes and just believe that they will do what the book says the codes will do. But a better way to learn is to actually write out the code in your text editor and run it to see whether what the book says about it is true. Secondly, as you write the code yourself, you will realize that there are certain aspects of the code like spacing, indentation, punctuation and so on, that you did not really notice at a glance but which can affect your outcome tremendously. You should, therefore, apply your hand to the task yourself and continue to practice often. It’s true what you were told, practice really does make perfect.

At the end of this book, there are answers to the exercises found in each chapter. Do not rush to go and check the answers. Instead, try hard to get the required result by yourself first. The beautiful thing about this language is that if you write the correct code, you will know because it will produce the desired output. While these exercises and examples are written to cover as much as possible of what you have learned, do not limit yourself to them. Go beyond them. Think of as many real-life problems as you can imagine and write codes to solve them. It’s an entertaining exercise which let’s you understand and acknowledge your skills and development.

How the Book is formatted

Codes are not necessarily eye-friendly. This is because they contain a mixture of symbols, letters and even numerical figures. It gets easier with practice as your eyes become accustomed to the Python language.

Again, as you go through the book, you will realize that we are building progressively on what was learned previously. As a result, sometimes it is necessary to repeat the code in the previous example or chapter with only a few modifications here and there to achieve the current result. Where this is the case, the repeated code is colored green just to help you distinguish it from whatever is new.

Thanks for buying this book. I really do hope that you enjoy it and it inspires you.  If you do feel that you have gained real value from it then please take two minutes to leave me an honest review.

It’s quick and easy and it will help others decide if they too could benefit from the book. Thanks in advance.

CHAPTER ONE

FIRST THINGS FIRST

In this chapter, we are going to go through a few preliminary preparations that need to be put in place for you to be able to learn python quickly and successfully. We assume you already have a personal computer. You may or may not have python installed on it at the moment. So, we are going to start with installation. This tutorial is for Python 3 on a Windows operating system.

Download and Install Python

Visit python’s website on www.python.org/downloads to download python for Windows. You will see various links for the respective python versions. Identify the link to Python 3 and click on it. Automatically, the installer that is compatible with your version of Windows will be downloaded into your computer. Now that you have downloaded it, double-click on the file and follow the steps in the prompt to install Python 3.

Download and Install a Text Editor

There are a number of text editors available to programmers using python. A text editor is what is otherwise called an Integrated Development Environment, IDE. It is a user-friendly environment that enables you to type in your codes easily, and which also makes it possible for you to test-run the code’s output in Windows command prompt screen. In this book, we will be using Geany. It is a simple text editor which contains everything that you need as a beginner learning to program in python.

To download Geany, go to www.geany.org and search for the setup.exe file. There are a number of versions that are available on the website. Download the most recent one and install by following the prompts.

RUNNING YOUR VERY FIRST Python Program

Now, start your program by opening Geany. You simply need to identify it in the list of programs on your computer and click on it. When it opens, save the empty program by a unique file name ending with the extension .py. Python as a programming language uses lower case letters. Just to make you stick with this fact early enough, type your file name in small letters. The important thing here is to ensure that whatever file name you type has a .py extension at the end. The purpose of the extension is to