What Is Programming? And How To Get Started
January 28, 2025
Article
This course is part of Python for Everybody Specialization
Instructor: Charles Russell Severance
1,093,208 already enrolled
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(96,315 reviews)
(96,315 reviews)
Explain the principles of data structures & how they are used
Create programs that are able to read and write data from files
Store data as key/value pairs using Python dictionaries
Accomplish multi-step tasks like sorting or looping using tuples
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This course will introduce the core data structures of the Python programming language. We will move past the basics of procedural programming and explore how we can use the Python built-in data structures such as lists, dictionaries, and tuples to perform increasingly complex data analysis. This course will cover Chapters 6-10 of the textbook “Python for Everybody”. This course covers Python 3.
In this class, we pick up where we left off in the previous class, starting in Chapter 6 of the textbook and covering Strings and moving into data structures. The second week of this class is dedicated to getting Python installed if you want to actually run the applications on your desktop or laptop. If you choose not to install Python, you can just skip to the third week and get a head start.
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In this module you will set things up so you can write Python programs. We do not require installation of Python for this class. You can write and test Python programs in the browser using the "Python Code Playground" in this lesson. Please read the "Using Python in this Class" material for details.
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Up to now, we have been working with data that is read from the user or data in constants. But real programs process much larger amounts of data by reading and writing files on the secondary storage on your computer. In this chapter we start to write our first programs that read, scan, and process real data.
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As we want to solve more complex problems in Python, we need more powerful variables. Up to now we have been using simple variables to store numbers or strings where we have a single value in a variable. Starting with lists we will store many values in a single variable using an indexing scheme to store, organize, and retrieve different values from within a single variable. We call these multi-valued variables "collections" or "data structures".
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The Python dictionary is one of its most powerful data structures. Instead of representing values in a linear list, dictionaries store data as key / value pairs. Using key / value pairs gives us a simple in-memory "database" in a single Python variable.
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Tuples are our third and final basic Python data structure. Tuples are a simple version of lists. We often use tuples in conjunction with dictionaries to accomplish multi-step tasks like sorting or looping through all of the data in a dictionary.
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To celebrate your making it to the halfway point in our Python for Everybody Specialization, we welcome you to attend our online graduation ceremony. It is not very long, and it features a Commencement speaker and very short commencement speech.
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We asked all learners to give feedback on our instructors based on the quality of their teaching style.
The mission of the University of Michigan is to serve the people of Michigan and the world through preeminence in creating, communicating, preserving and applying knowledge, art, and academic values, and in developing leaders and citizens who will challenge the present and enrich the future.
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Taking this course by University of Michigan may provide you with a preview of the topics, materials and instructors in a related degree program which can help you decide if the topic or university is right for you.
Taking this course by University of Michigan may provide you with a preview of the topics, materials and instructors in a related degree program which can help you decide if the topic or university is right for you.
University of Michigan
Degree · 1 – 3 years
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Reviewed on Aug 6, 2020
I love the way this class i taught. I have been able to understand the logic and flow of programming more than I ever have, even after taking 3 other programming classes in college before!!Thank you!
Reviewed on Jun 18, 2020
Great course for pyhton. Loved this course and enjoyed it. Thanks to Dr.Chuck. If anyone who want to take a course which is well explained and fun for python learning, then Hey!!! this is your course.
Reviewed on Mar 23, 2021
This course was perfect for me. It was very interactive and included the essential topics I wanted to learn. The coding site they offer was the main thing to improve my skills, I really appreciate it.
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