Nerd Break – Learning Python

I have programming experience, but in all my years of university, barely anything was said about python in classes. At some point I decided that for personal (and potentially professional reasons), I should get with the program(ming) and learn languages other than javascript and variations of C. Luckily, the internet is full of resources and some of them are even good ones.

A good starting point is the Python website itself. They have guides for non-programmers, beginners, and people slightly familiar with coding. There are books and websites available that also focus on python from a bioinformatics perspective, which makes it a extra interesting.

The best find so far? Google’s Programming YouTube videos. Google had someone to teach python classes to their staff, the classes were recorded and put on the web for free.

Day 1 Part 1

Day 1 Part 2

Day 1 Part 3

Day 2 Part 1

Day 2 Part 2

Day 2 Part 3

Day 2 Part 4

There is also this section on Software Carpentry that is totally amazing. Full of ppt and pdf’s, and great for people familiar with some programming concepts.

Other Sources of Information Include:
– Think Python: How to Think Like a Computer Scientist by Allen Downey (free pdf manuscript is availible here)
– Introduction to Computer Science with Python (pdf),on MIT OpenCourseware
– CodeAcademy – Python Lessons