Fundamentals of Programming
--Originally published at Coding The Future
If you are reading this right now, you were probably procrastinating, and just started studying for tomorrow's test, right?
Well, as always, I've got you covered. Here's a quick video summary of what you need to know for the first partial. I hope things are not too strange.
Good luck!
--Originally published at Coding The Future
Hey everyone! I know it's been a while since I last posted, but guess what? I'm in the middle of first-term partials.
Partials in almost any university mean long hours of reviewing content and doing exercises over and over until mastering every possible math problem.
However, in the mist of exam-time chaos, ideas seem to come to me more often than usual, but obviously I cannot currently work on these genius ideas due to obvious reasons. So today, I decided to take a brief break from stuDYING and from Python to talk to you about something that really interests me: teaching kids how to code.
Coding is basically an essential ability now a days, and according to CODE.org only 1 in every 4 schools teach computer science, in the US alone! So, if we are speaking about the whole world, we are obviously talking about less than 1 in every 4, especially in developing countries. Why are kids learning biology, geography, or even math, and not programming, if they are all equally relevant?
Source: CODE.org
For this reason (and because my professor @Ken_Bauer was also talking about it in class) I have pledged to help kids in my community learn how to code.
Sometime right after exam time is over, I will be contacting my sister's elementary school to propose them a free coding course in the first week of December. I have chosen my sister's elementary for a particular reason: it's an girls-only school. It is no lie there is a lack of women in the tech industry, and that begins from a very early phase, because schools usually encourage girls to pursue other types of careers, especially in conservative countries like mine.
The awesomest part about it, is that I've got mayor companies backing me up Continue reading "SPREADING THE WORD – An initiative to teach kids to code"
--Originally published at Coding The Future
Well hello there, fellow Python learners! Today, the spirit of one of the great masters of the Python language has inspired me to initiate you into the Python lifestyle. Just like in any discipline or lifestyle, in the Python language, there is a set of basic principles.
This great master, who I previously mentioned is Tim Peters, who in the year 2004 CE found the way to perfection in the Python language. He wrote:
Beautiful is better than ugly.
Explicit is better than implicit.
Simple is better than complex.
Complex is better than complicated.
Flat is better than nested.
Sparse is better than dense.
Readability counts.
Special cases aren't special enough to break the rules.
Although practicality beats purity.
Errors should never pass silently.
Unless explicitly silenced.
In the face of ambiguity, refuse the temptation to guess.
There should be one –and preferably only one– obvious way to do it.
Although that way may not be obvious at first unless you're Dutch.
Now is better than never.
Although never is often better than right now.
If the implementation is hard to explain, it's a bad idea.
If the implementation is easy to explain, it may be a good idea.
Namespaces are one honking great idea -- let's do more of those!
These, my friends, are the ideology on which the Python culture rests. Here's a brief explanation of each:
--Originally published at Coding The Future
Well hello there, fellow Python learners! Today, the spirit of one of the great masters of the Python language has inspired me to initiate you into the Python lifestyle. Just like in any discipline or lifestyle, in the Python language, there is a set of basic principles.
This great master, who I previously mentioned is Tim Peters, who in the year 2004 CE found the way to perfection in the Python language. He wrote:
Beautiful is better than ugly.
Explicit is better than implicit.
Simple is better than complex.
Complex is better than complicated.
Flat is better than nested.
Sparse is better than dense.
Readability counts.
Special cases aren't special enough to break the rules.
Although practicality beats purity.
Errors should never pass silently.
Unless explicitly silenced.
In the face of ambiguity, refuse the temptation to guess.
There should be one –and preferably only one– obvious way to do it.
Although that way may not be obvious at first unless you're Dutch.
Now is better than never.
Although never is often better than right now.
If the implementation is hard to explain, it's a bad idea.
If the implementation is easy to explain, it may be a good idea.
Namespaces are one honking great idea -- let's do more of those!
These, my friends, are the ideology on which the Python culture rests. Here's a brief explanation of each:
--Originally published at Coding The Future
If you are a Lady Gaga fan, you are probably familiar with her famous line "I don't speak German, but I can if you like" from her song SchieBe. This lyric line has always intrigued me, but it has acquired a new meaning since I started programming. Why? Because once you learn an object-oriented language, all others come naturally in a matter of days.
I started coding on Python 3 for the first time last week, and coming from C# on Visual Studio 2008 felt like a natural transition. All the syntax is pretty much the same, and some is even simpler, which is an amazing thing!
I have taken the time to compile the most basic syntax that I've learned on Python so far. Enjoy!
When we think about coding, commenting often goes as an underestimated feature. Consequently, I decided to start my post with comments.
#COMMENTS: To comment, use a number sign and then write your comment.
Unlike other programming languages, I've realized that on Python, you don't have to declare the variable type when declaring a variable. To declare a variable, just type the name, and if you want to, give it a value. Even though you don't need to, I usually give integer-type variables a default value of zero. You can also declare strings and arrays using the appropriate brackets.
i = 5
j = 6
k = i + j
y = [1,3,5,8]
x = ('Emanuel')
To output a variable or just some text, you can use the print class. Remember you can always combine several variables or variables with text by concatenating using the plus sign.
print ('Hello World!')
print ('Hello, ' + x)
print (k)
print (y)
print (y[2])
I'll be Continue reading "I DON’T SPEAK GERMAN (BUT I CAN IF YOU LIKE)"
--Originally published at Coding The Future
If you are a Lady Gaga fan, you are probably familiar with her famous line "I don't speak German, but I can if you like" from her song SchieBe. This lyric line has always intrigued me, but it has acquired a new meaning since I started programming. Why? Because once you learn an object-oriented language, all others come naturally in a matter of days.
I started coding on Python 3 for the first time last week, and coming from C# on Visual Studio 2008 felt like a natural transition. All the syntax is pretty much the same, and some is even simpler, which is an amazing thing!
I have taken the time to compile the most basic syntax that I've learned on Python so far. Enjoy!
When we think about coding, commenting often goes as an underestimated feature. Consequently, I decided to start my post with comments.
#COMMENTS: To comment, use a number sign and then write your comment.
Unlike other programming languages, I've realized that on Python, you don't have to declare the variable type when declaring a variable. To declare a variable, just type the name, and if you want to, give it a value. Even though you don't need to, I usually give integer-type variables a default value of zero. You can also declare strings and arrays using the appropriate brackets.
i = 5
j = 6
k = i + j
y = [1,3,5,8]
x = ('Emanuel')
To output a variable or just some text, you can use the print class. Remember you can always combine several variables or variables with text by concatenating using the plus sign.
print ('Hello World!')
print ('Hello, ' + x)
print (k)
print (y)
print (y[2])
I'll be Continue reading "I DON’T SPEAK GERMAN… But I can if you like"
--Originally published at Coding The Future
If you are a Lady Gaga fan, you are probably familiar with her famous line "I don't speak German, but I can if you like" from her song SchieBe. This lyric line has always intrigued me, but it has acquired a new meaning since I started programming. Why? Because once you learn an object-oriented language, all others come naturally in a matter of days.
I started coding on Python 3 for the first time last week, and coming from C# on Visual Studio 2008 felt like a natural transition. All the syntax is pretty much the same, and some is even simpler, which is an amazing thing!
I have taken the time to compile the most basic syntax that I've learned on Python so far. Enjoy!
When we think about coding, commenting often goes as an underestimated feature. Consequently, I decided to start my post with comments.
#COMMENTS: To comment, use a number sign and then write your comment.
Unlike other programming languages, I've realized that on Python, you don't have to declare the variable type when declaring a variable. To declare a variable, just type the name, and if you want to, give it a value. Even though you don't need to, I usually give integer-type variables a default value of zero. You can also declare strings and arrays using the appropriate brackets.
i = 5
j = 6
k = i + j
y = [1,3,5,8]
x = ('Emanuel')
To output a variable or just some text, you can use the print class. Remember you can always combine several variables or variables with text by concatenating using the plus sign.
print ('Hello World!')
print ('Hello, ' + x)
print (k)
print (y)
print (y[2])
I'll be Continue reading "I DON’T SPEAK GERMAN… But I can if you like"
--Originally published at Coding The Future
If you are a Lady Gaga fan, you are probably familiar with her famous line "I don't speak German, but I can if you like" from her song SchieBe. This lyric line has always intrigued me, but it has acquired a new meaning since I started programming. Why? Because once you learn an object-oriented language, all others come naturally in a matter of days.
I started coding on Python 3 for the first time last week, and coming from C# on Visual Studio 2008 felt like a natural transition. All the syntax is pretty much the same, and some is even simpler, which is an amazing thing!
I have taken the time to compile the most basic syntax that I've learned on Python so far. Enjoy!
When we think about coding, commenting often goes as an underestimated feature. Consequently, I decided to start my post with comments.
#COMMENTS: To comment, use a number sign and then write your comment.
Unlike other programming languages, I've realized that on Python, you don't have to declare the variable type when declaring a variable. To declare a variable, just type the name, and if you want to, give it a value. Even though you don't need to, I usually give integer-type variables a default value of zero. You can also declare strings and arrays using the appropriate brackets.
i = 5
j = 6
k = i + j
y = [1,3,5,8]
x = ('Emanuel')
To output a variable or just some text, you can use the print class. Remember you can always combine several variables or variables with text by concatenating using the plus sign.
print ('Hello World!')
print ('Hello, ' + x)
print (k)
print (y)
print (y[2])
I'll be Continue reading "I DON’T SPEAK GERMAN… But I can if you like"
