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Learner Reviews & Feedback for Using Python to Access Web Data by University of Michigan

4.8
stars
44,164 ratings

About the Course

This course will show how one can treat the Internet as a source of data. We will scrape, parse, and read web data as well as access data using web APIs. We will work with HTML, XML, and JSON data formats in Python. This course will cover Chapters 11-13 of the textbook “Python for Everybody”. To succeed in this course, you should be familiar with the material covered in Chapters 1-10 of the textbook and the first two courses in this specialization. These topics include variables and expressions, conditional execution (loops, branching, and try/except), functions, Python data structures (strings, lists, dictionaries, and tuples), and manipulating files. This course covers Python 3....
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High quality content

(256 Reviews)

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(217 Reviews)

Top reviews

SM

Jun 18, 2020

This course was really interesting and did a good job introducing complicated topics in usefully simplified form. It was a pleasure to listen to the instructor and I got everything I wanted out of it.

AB

Jun 6, 2019

Getting a bit more challenging than the earlier courses in the specialization. The exercises require more struggle, but all the information is there. Another step along the way. Thank you, Dr. Chuck!

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201 - 225 of 7,952 Reviews for Using Python to Access Web Data

By Brian D H I

Sep 22, 2020

This course is great! After reading some of the other reviews I think some people missed the point, some said that the course was too difficult but I disagree, the level of difficulty was perfect, Dr. Chuck thought you enough to be able to complete the assignments as long as you really tried and not so much that you would just need to copy and paste the answer from the lectures. I loved this course and I'll continue to take the next one in the coursera specialization.

By Calvin K

Jun 10, 2017

Man, I love Dr Chuck! He explains things in a way that's incredibly easy for anyone to understand. I finished the course in just a couple of days as I'm already quite familiar with Python and most of the stuff and just wanted to use the course as a refresher and checked see if there's any knowledge point that I was missing, but this course is awesome and I recommend it to anyone who's new to getting data from the web! I think I'll take all Dr Chuck's courses in the future!

By Jay T

Nov 16, 2020

This was the first course out of the specialization where i had NO prior knowledge and I must say, Dr. Chuck makes the learning process so fun and rewarding. I am happy that we learned XML first and then he saved the best for last with JSON and it did feel easier. I would recommend py4e not only to python beginners, but to ALL computer science beginners. This is the root to your computer science adventure and the options after this are truly limitless. Rock on Dr. Chuck!

By Sambath M

Mar 28, 2020

I'm very happy that people like you guys are doing this awesome project which is free teaching.

I loved the course from Dr Chuck, and I learned a lot in this one, about playing and analyzing data in its globality.

I also learn how data travel through the Internet, and I was captivated by all the process a Data has to do to be read by a user.

Overall this course is fascinating, and a big thank you to Dr Chuck & All the staff that make this course possible. I love you all.

By Carlos H

Jun 18, 2016

Great class. Goes over the basics of pulling data from online sources: HTML, XML, JSON. Also goes over the basics of those 3 so if you know nothing about those, the class is helpful. Coming from knowing literally zero about Python and starting from course 1, this is the first course out of the specialization where the assignments were a little tougher and took some googling. (PS I'm using Python 3, so it may be a little more straight forward with 2, I'm not sure though)

By Ganesh U

Mar 3, 2019

This was excellent course. It was the 3rd one I took under Python for Everybody. The first 2 were easy, probably since i already knew Python basics. The assignments in this one truly tested my understanding of the topics covered. I had to go back to videos to second time, before I could start on the assignments. Before starting, I was completely new to data formats XML and jSON. Prof Chuck, explained the concepts very well, starting with basics, and building up nicely.

By Mullai P

May 18, 2020

I am very much thankful to the university and to the professor Dr Charles Severance for offering this beautiful course.Such an amazing and adorning course which helps you to understand Python right from the basics to the core with much clear and deep understanding.The important thing is professor makes the concept very simple so that we easily put that into programming syntax.Thank much for Teaching Assistant also for guiding us in exploring our program much deeper.

By Manuel J T M

Nov 24, 2018

I'm very gratefull for you allow me to free enroll the course . When I finished the previous course from the Naijin University I need to improve my skills in managing web pages with Python and the course "Using Python to Access Web Data" is absolutely suited for this purpose.

Again, thank you, and I may say it is very nice this "anglo" kind of teaching. The assignments are perfect for consolidate the knowledge.

Congratulations four your course and sorry for my english.

By Richard C

Jan 30, 2017

Third one down in the specialization and still loving the courses. I quite enjoy the fact that the assignments are not given to us step by step but instead make us think through what is required. The lectures provide the basics needed to complete the assignment but you have to understand and extrapolate on the basics provided. Still very motivated so far. The next course is the main reason I enrolled in this class, getting to play with databases. Thank you Dr. Chuck.

By Bogdan R

Dec 5, 2015

Extremely good explanations as all courses in the specialization (sometimes much too well explained, as the course targets complete beginners). Additionally, it provides a lot of value by effectively stringing a series on mini courses on specific standard Python libraries, which is something not found everywhere:

* the regular expressions library

* libraries for web communication (socket and urllib)

* parsing HTML (beautiful soup)

* data transfer libraries (XML and JSON)

By Hafsah M

Jan 4, 2022

I really liked the way the whole course was structured, with the lessons, quiz, assignments and then the bonus materials in every week. The quizzes really helped me to evaluate myself and get to know if I actually understood the material or not. The assignments, even though they were a bit challenging sometimes, really helped me strengthen my skills. And, of course, as always, Dr. Chuck taught everything really well in the lectures. All in all, an amazing course!

By kishor c

May 20, 2020

I just finished Using" Python to Access Web Data", which is the 3rd course in the Python for Everybody specialization.The course wasn't so easy as the previous courses in the specialization as I had to spend more time debugging and practicing.This course will show how one can treat the Internet as a source of data. We will scrape, parse, and read web data as well as access data using webAPIs. We will also work with HTML, XML, and JSON data formats in Python.

By Ausra K

Dec 8, 2020

This is the part of Python for Everybody specialization where you start seeing things, especially things on web, in a totally different light. Suddenly all the buttons and windows become strings of data described in a certain clearly defined and agreed upon way. There is xml and JSON, and you get to understand what they carry in them - things that you're already familiar with, like lists and dictionaries. This is the point where it really gets interesting!

By Jia Q

May 27, 2021

I would like to give this course a five star. This would be the best python course for beginners. The course modulators are being responsible, they check and answer questions from the class forum everyday. For the contents, there are free pdf books and well-written codes for students to read and practice. The web parts are not solely about coding, I also learned some basic underlying mechanisms. I will definitely continue learning the rest of the courses.

By Chris C

Nov 27, 2023

Dr. Chuck is an excellent teacher. We all know this to be true. Dr. Chuck is an excellent instructor. We all know this to be true. This course, "Using Python to Access Web Data" can be a bit of a challenge at times - at least it was for me. This is a good thing! Be sure to take your time and work with (and through) the examples. There is a lot of information here. After completing this course, I really feel like I achieved another level in my skills.

By KIM S

Jul 6, 2017

If you are a newbie who has no knowledge in this particular area of programming , you will be surprised to know the fact that the more you try to eagerly learn this subject, the less you have confidence in this. However, as I have gone through this course, I have realized one thing that it is worth try, and you will never regret what you have done or will do in the forthcoming journey that you will one day face.

Hope you do not ever give up.

Sincerely,

By Kevin K

Dec 12, 2017

This was an excellent introductory course to accessing web data. Almost all of the concepts (aside from basic python syntax) were entirely new to me, and this has primed me for when I encounter these subjects in the future.

Pros: encompasses many ideas that are important and introduces key concepts

Cons: I'm not positive I can derive most of the codes I wrote on my own, but rather relied on editing sample code to make the assignment submissions work.

By Aditya K

Dec 17, 2019

I personally found Doctor Chuck's thorough approach to be very beginner-friendly. This is an absolute gem of a course for the budding programmers out there who want an insight into the computer networking functionality, serialization and deserialization of data. It is appropriately paced for learning how to parse webpages and interact with APIs. All in all, I'd recommend this course for everyone beginning with scraping webpages. Thank you Coursera!

By Christopher H

Nov 8, 2015

Extremely useful exercises in pulling data down and getting it ready to process within python. Very nice (and refreshing realistic) that the programming assignments were of the form "modify this existing code to do something new with this different data source" rather than "build something new from scratch". No academic hangups about the paedogogical value of building something from the ground up. And Dr. Chuck is a wonderfully engaging teacher.

By Onkar K

May 13, 2020

This was my 3rd course in the specialization series and was it a blast. I really liked how the things quickly went from 'Oh I can count numbers in a text file without any tracebacks' to 'Oh I can count numbers from a json file which is on web and has dictionaries with lists in them which have dictionaries in them too'

Really liked the pacing, the new assignments style, and of course the man, the legend DR. CHUCK. Overall this course was a blast.

By Amir B

Jan 29, 2018

Yet another educational, interesting and very much enjoyable course about Python, led by Dr. Chuck. Finding myself occasionally smiling to the laptop while looking at a Python tutorial really says it all.

The content chosen for the course as well as the way the content is taught - it is really something to appreciate. Thank you Dr. Chuck, for sharing your talent to teach with the rest of us.

Using Databases with Python - here i come!

Thank you.

By Vasanth p

May 13, 2019

Great course that taught me from the basic operations to APIs where I can scrape data from the web with a small automation python script. The instructor is very talented and his choice of words during the class is like a sculptor who removes unwanted parts of a sculpture. Sharp and crystal clear explanation about concepts that are easily understandable by the beginner. I highly recommend this course to the Python beginners and intermediates.

By Ayush N

Aug 1, 2020

I loved learning with coursera especially in the time time of pandemic(COVID-19) where the whole world was shutdown and people were forced to live at their home for their own safety.In these hard times students were free at their home and bored and have nothing much to do but coursera gave an oppurtunity to all the stuents in the world to learn for free esoecially for college going student.So i am having a great time here with DR.Chuck

By Lye H F

Dec 6, 2020

One of the best free courses available for Python. Practical & well-thought from Dr. Chuck. Extremely talented & passionate in teaching programming. He makes difficult to understand subject interesting and easy to understand. Learn some great insight about processing web data in XML & JSON. Great assignments provided too, which has good practical value in real-life web world. Thank you, Dr. Chuck, for making all these completely free.

By NANDA A

Apr 26, 2020

this course given me a really ass data.......thankyou for the people of univ of michigan....and courseera for providing like this platform to learn and also i would like to request you to provide a bonus video like how to get a API key and all other stuff from twitter or something else from scratch......i mean pls make a video that how to create developer account and what are the required steps to get an API key

thank you once again