Introductory Python

This is a class for computer-literate people with no programming background who wish to learn basic Python programming. The course is aimed at those who want to learn “data wrangling” – manipulating downloaded files to make them amenable to analysis. We concentrate on language basics such as list and string manipulation, control structures, simple data analysis packages, and introduce modules for downloading data from the web.

This Introductory Python class runs over four weeks, with five hours of class per week (split into 2 ½ hour evening classes). Classes will be given in a lab setting, with student exercises mixed with lectures. There will be a modest amount of homework after each class. Due to the focused nature of this course, there will be no individual class projects but the instructors will be available to help students who are applying Python to their own work outside of class.

Required Materials

Students should bring a laptop to class.

Unit 1: List manipulation

• Simple values and expressions
• Defining functions, using ordinary syntax and lambda syntax
• Lists
• Built-in functions and subscripting
• Nested lists
• Functional operators: map and filter
• List comprehensions
• Multiple-list operations: map and zip
• Functional operators: reduce

Unit 2: Strings and simple I/O

• Characters
• Strings as lists of characters
• Built-in string operations
• Input files as lists of strings
• Print statement
• Reading data from the web
• Using the requests package
• String-based web scraping (e.g. handling csv files)

Unit 3: Control structures

• Statements vs. expressions
• For loops
• Variables in for loops
• If statements
• Simple and nested if statements
• Conditional expressions in lambda functions
• While loops
• break and continue

Unit 4: Data Analysis Packages

• NumPy
  • Ndarray
  • Subscripting and slicing
  • Operations
• Pandas
  • Data Structure
  • Data Manipulation
  • Grouping and Aggregation