#python resources

https://topofy.com/how-much-python-learn-get-job/I never realised before, that when you embed these links they automatically populate your hastag at the bottom of your post. That is very presumptuous.

Nevertheless, reading an article about Python because I was advised to learn it for my marketing job in order to properly understand data analytics. Think I’ll see how I get on with Java first, one step at a time! The most interesting thing for me (about Python) is how much of it can be done through self learning. The course work recommend is one hour tuition and 8 hours self study a week for 6 weeks, interesting.

“Python was created in 1989 by Guido van Rossum and is a fully interpreted, high-level, and general-purpose programming language.  It’s used for a wide variety of applications including web and mobile app development. It’s an open-source programming language and is object-oriented.”

Another article I read about it was titled “How Much Python Do I Have To Learn To Get A Job?“ which says:

“I did a job search and found more than 52,000 jobs advertised. So, if you want a Python job, you have a lot of options. Even if you don’t have a formal computer science education, you can learn how to code in Python.”

Interesting!

Python is one of the most widely used high-level programming languages worldwide, and not without the reasons. There aren’t too many languages around that offer as much versatility as Python and still be easy to understand and learn. This language provides much more viable semantically and is exceptional when it comes to the expression of the logic attached with the code. Its simplicity makes it one of the preferred choices of the most seasoned programmers.

If you are more driven by the utilitarian aspects of a programming language, then you will be glad to know that Python is among the top ranking languages that draw the maximum remuneration.

Although Python offers simplicity, it is still exceptionally powerful. While learning the language, you get introduced to the machine learning basics. Python can also be used to create huge web platforms. Pinterest, one of the biggest image sharing sites, incorporates this language very effectively.

The communities have made Python even more versatile. If you want to learn the language and draw the inspiration from the world class programmers, then you are at the right place. We have compiled the list of top resources on the internet to learn this language.

1-Read about Python

Learn Python the Hard Way was my first introduction to Python and several programming concepts. Author Zed A. Shaw made the book accessible online for free, but he has a special place in his heart and inbox for people who pay the small sum of $29.95. The practical exercises within are well worth going through. Make sure you write out as much of the code as possible: it’s only through mastery of the basics that you can become an expert.

2-Watch Python Videos

If you’re more of a visual learner, you can learn about the fundamentals of using Python for the web with this excellent free Udacity course. Of course, there’s more where that came from, with a variety of courses from everything to data fundamentals in Python to machine learning. I went through the series myself, and though it’s a bit long (and there are a lot of exercises that I didn’t think added that much value), the end result was that I came out of the tutorial with a deeper understanding of how data moves across the web.

You can also catch plenty of Python videos on Coursera, Treehouse and Udemy.

3- Look through lists of Python Learning Resources

This might be a little bit meta, but I love lists of resources. One of the hidden secrets to finding those great resources are going through Github repositories. Github is the Google Docs of code, a great collection of “repositories” where coders can “commit” their code to a shared codebase. It’s also a place where people love compiling great collections of programming resources.

This particular link above is a favorite collection of mine. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

4- Anaconda and iPython Notebook

Anaconda and iPython Notebook are what I commonly refer to as the “Excel” of Python. It can be hard to work with the Python interpreter (the command line prompt where you enter Python code if you install it from Python.org) as is. You can’t really refer back to the work that you’ve done before very easily without saving a whole variety of Python files, and it can be pretty hard to share your code with the web at large in HTML form, especially with different charts and graphs and a structured flow you want to convey that goes beyond just one Python script.

iPython Notebooks allow you to write your code in Notebook form.

Anaconda and iPython Notebook make it intuitive and visually appealing to organize different Python software modules, and bring them together so that you can work and show your results as easily as possible with nbviewer, which generates a HTML version of your Notebooks that you can share on Github. A lot of popular modules we talk about like Pandas are pre-installed, saving you some time. When you click on the next link, you’ll see exactly what it looks like using iPython Notebook.

5-Slice and dice data with Pandas

Built on the aforementioned iPython Notebook, Julia Evans has created a “cookbook” for the Pandas module, a collection of Python code that can help you handle relatively large data sets with ease.

Python can only help you process what you can fit in memory on your computer, but that’s more than enough for most of your data needs. Pandas will help you efficiently process that data: you’ll be able to read from very large CSVs and clean them up so you can find great data insights and visualize them (more on that in point #10!)

6-Build something small with Flask

Flask is what is termed as a micro-framework, a set of code that you can lean on to build small web projects. It has a bunch of reuseable components that help you build interactive websites that can both receive and transmit data. Give it a try: in a few lines of codes, you can get something interactive going on the web!

7-Build something big with Django

If you’re tired of the word micro, and want to go with a full web framework, build something with Django! Django is used to this day to build very large websites including Pinterest, and Instagram.

8-Play around with Python APIs and even more!

We had a list of learning resources before on Github, now we can explore a list of the things that make Python awesome! I especially love using Python to play with Application Programming Interfaces or APIs. APIs are a set of rules for servers to communicate data with one another: what this means is that with Python, you can scrape your personal fitness information from your Fitbit or work with Google Sheets automation easily. You can do anything that involves getting data from a server willing to give it to you.

You’ll find a list of really cool APIs above that will allow you to play with all sorts of cool data!

9-Do some machine learning with Python

Have you heard of machine learning? It’s all the rage today and the reason why is because it allows you to do more with less. By having machines learn patterns in your data and by being able to infer conclusions from smaller data sets to larger populations with their insights, machine learning lets you know more about the world around you with less data points.

This Github repository offers a fantastic dive into the fundamentals of machine learning, and gets you to practically embark on your machine learning adventure with sample code sets.

10-Tell data stories with Plotly

Data doesn’t mean anything unless you can storytell with it. You can throw all the numbers in the world at people but it won’t mean they’re any closer to understanding your point. You really have to break down your data into meaningful chunks for it to go anywhere.

11 Great Resources to Learn and Work in Python

Python is one of the most widely used high-level programming languages worldwide, and not without the reasons. There aren’t too many languages around that offer as much versatility as Python and still be easy to understand and learn. This language provides much more viable semantically and is exceptional when it comes to the expression of the logic attached with the code. Its simplicity makes it…

Opening modes for files

Idiomatic Python guide, by David Goodger

I found this a few minutes ago after checking a thread on coding style. The page on tuples is so much clearer than my mess of notes. I’ll read the rest later.

Dive Into Python 3.3 Introducing Tuples

Dive Into Python 3.2 Introducing Lists

Learn Python the Hard Way -- Really not so hard, more like jumping in blind and learning from doing. I learn better from writing things down and listening to lectures, so I’ve popped in and out of lessons. I plan on going straight through once my class ends.

Online Python Tutor -- This is a web app that runs through your code and shows you which line is doing what as the program executes. Helps with debugging.

46 Simple Python Exercises -- Sometimes coming up with projects is hard...but how can you get better if you don’t practice? This page has 46 projects, which can be elaborated on. Some can be solved in 3 or 4 lines...some, not so much.