Introduction to Programming with Python

Marty Stepp (stepp@cs.washington.edu) University of Washington

Special thanks to Scott Shawcroft, Ryan Tucker, and Paul Beck for their work on these slides. Except where otherwise noted, this work is licensed under: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0

Outline
Programming languages and Python Basic programs and numeric data Control statements Text processing What's next? / CSE 142 at UW

Languages
Some influential ones:
FORTRAN
science / engineering

COBOL
business data

LISP
logic and AI

BASIC
a simple language

Python
Created in 1991 by Guido van Rossum (now at Google)
Named for Monty Python

Useful as a scripting language

script: A program meant for use in small/medium projects

Used by:
Google, Yahoo!, Youtube Many Linux distributions Games and apps (e.g. Eve Online)

Installing Python
Windows: Download Python from http://www.python.org Install Python. Run Idle from the Start Menu. Mac OS X: Python is already installed. Open a terminal and run python or run Idle from Finder. Linux: Chances are you already have Python installed. To check, run python from the terminal. If not, install from your distribution's package system.
Note: For step by step installation instructions, see the course web site.

Interpreted Languages
interpreted
Not compiled like many other languages (Java, C, C++) Code is written and then directly executed by an interpreter Type commands into interpreter and see immediate results

Java:

Code

Compiler

Runtime Environment

Computer

Python:

Code

Interpreter

Computer

The Python Interpreter

Allows you to type commands one-at-a-time and see results A great way to explore Python's syntax

Basic Programs and Numeric Data

The print Statement

A Python program's code is just written directly into a file
print "text" print (a blank line)
hello.py
1 print "Hello, world!"

swallows.py
1 2 3 4 print "Hello, world!" print print "Suppose two swallows carry it together." print "African or European swallow?"

Comments
Syntax:
# comment text (one line)

swallows2.py
1 2 3 4 5 6 # Suzy Student, CSE 142, Fall 2097 # This program prints important messages. print "Hello, world!" print # blank line print "Suppose two swallows \"carry\" it together." print 'African or "European" swallows?'

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Expressions
expression: A value or operation(s) to compute a value.
Example: 1 + 4 * 3

Arithmetic operators:
+ - * / ** % add, subtract/negate, multiply, divide exponentiate modulus, a.k.a. remainder

precedence: Order in which operations are computed.

* / % ** have a higher precedence than + 1 + 3 * 4 is 13 (1 + 3) * 4 is 16
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Integer division
When we divide integers with / , the quotient is an integer.
3 4 ) 14 12 2 35 / 5 is 7 84 / 10 is 8 52 27 ) 1425 135 75 54 21

The % operator computes a remainder from integer division.

3 4 ) 14 12 2 43 5 ) 218 20 18 15 3
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Variables
variable: A named piece of memory that stores a value.

assignment: Stores a value into a variable.

Syntax: name = expression Examples: x = 5 gpa = 3.14

gpa

3.14

A variable can be used in expressions. x + 4 is 9

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Exercise
This program's code is redundant. Improve it with variables:
print print print print print print print print "Subtotal:" 38 + 40 + 30 "Tax:" (38 + 40 + 30) * .09 "Tip:" (38 + 40 + 30) * .15 "Total:" 38 + 40 + 30 + (38 + 40 + 30) * .15 + (38 + 40 + 30) * .09

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Data Types
type: A category or set of data values.
Constrains the operations that can be performed on the data Examples: integer, real number, text string

Python is relaxed about types.

A variable's type does not need to be declared. A variable can change types as a program is running.
Value Python type 42 int 3.14 float "ni!" str

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Parameters
parameter: A value supplied to a command as you run it.
Syntax: command ( value ) command ( value, value, ..., value )

Example:
print sqrt(25) print sqrt(15 + 10 * 10 + 6) x = 5 print sqrt(x + sqrt(16))

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Math commands
Function name abs(value) ceil(value) cos(value) floor(value) log10(value) max(value1, value2) min(value1, value2) round(value) sin(value) sqrt(value) Description absolute value rounds up cosine, in radians rounds down logarithm, base 10 larger of two values smaller of two values nearest whole number sine, in radians square root Constant e pi Description 2.7182818... 3.1415926...

To use these commands, place this line atop your program:

from math import *
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input
input : Reads a number from the user's keyboard.
You can store the result of input into a variable. Example:
age = input("How old are you? ") print "Your age is", age print "You have", 65 - age, "years until retirement"

Output:
How old are you? 53 Your age is 53 You have 12 years until retirement

Exercise: Modify the restaurant program to ask the user

how much of a tip to leave.
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Control Statements

if
if statement: Executes a set of commands only if a certain condition is True. Otherwise, the commands are skipped.
Syntax: if condition: statements Example: gpa = input("What is your GPA? ") if gpa > 2.0: print "Your application is accepted."

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if/else
if/else statement: Executes one set of statements if a certain condition is True, and a second set if it is False.
Syntax: if condition: statements else: statements Example:
gpa = input("What is your GPA? ") if gpa > 2.0: print "Welcome to Mars University!" else: print "Your application is denied."

Multiple conditions can be chained with elif

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Logic
Operator == != < > <= >= Meaning equals does not equal less than greater than less than or equal to greater than or equal to Example 1 + 1 == 2 3.2 != 2.5 10 < 5 10 > 5 126 <= 100 5.0 >= 5.0 Result True True False True False True

Logical expressions can be combined using logical operators:

Operator and or not Example (9 != 6) and (2 < 3) (2 == 3) or (-1 < 5) not (7 > 0) Result True True False

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for loops
for name in range(start, end): statements for name in range(start, end, step): statements Repeats for values start (inclusive) to end (exclusive)
>>> for i in range(2, 6): print i 2 3 4 5 >>> for i in range(15, 0, -5): print i, "squared is", (i * i) 15 squared is 225 10 squared is 100 5 squared is 25

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Cumulative loops
Some loops incrementally compute a value. sometimes called a cumulative loop
sum = 0 for i in range(1, 11): sum = sum + (i * i) print "sum of first 10 squares is", sum Output: sum of first 10 squares is 385

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Exercise
Write a program that reads a student's homework scores as input and computes the student's homework percentage.
This program computes your average homework grade. How many assignments were there? 3 Assignment 1 Points earned? 12 Points possible? 15 Assignment 2 Points earned? 10 Points possible? 20 Assignment 3 Points earned? 4 Points possible? 5 Your total score: 26 / 40 : 65 %
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while
while loop: Executes as long as a condition is True. good for indefinite loops (repeat an unknown number of times) Syntax:
while condition: statements

Example:
number = 1 while number < 200: print number, number = number * 2

Output:
1 2 4 8 16 32 64 128
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Random numbers
from random import * randint(min, max) Produces a random value between min and max (inclusive) Example: coinflip = randint(1, 2) if coinflip == 1: print "Heads" else: print "Tails"

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Exercise
Write a program that plays a guessing game with the user:
Let's play a game. Try to guess my number from 1-100! Your guess? 40 Too low. Your guess? 85 Too high. Your guess? 68 Too high. Your guess? 51 Too low. Your guess? 57 Too low. Your guess? 63 Too high. Your guess? 61 You got it right in 7 guesses!
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Text Processing

Strings
string: A sequence of text characters in a program.
Strings start and end with quote " or apostrophe ' characters. "hello" "This is a string" "This, too, is a string.

It can be very long!"

A string can represent special characters with a backslash.

\" \t \\ quotation mark character tab character backslash character

"Bob said, \"Hello!\" to Susan."

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Indexes
Characters in a string are numbered with indexes :
name = "P. Diddy"
index character 0 P 1 . 2 3 D 4 i 5 d 6 d 7 y

Accessing an individual character from a string:

variable [ index ] print name, "starts with", name[0] Output: P. Diddy starts with P

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String properties
len(string) str.lower(string) str.upper(string) Example:
name = "Martin Douglas Stepp" big_name = str.upper(name) print big_name, "has", len(big_name), "characters"

- number of characters in a string (including spaces) - lowercase version of a string - uppercase version of a string

Output:
MARTIN DOUGLAS STEPP has 20 characters

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raw_input
raw_input : Reads a string of text from the user's keyboard.
Example: name = raw_input("Howdy. What's yer name? ") print name, "... what a silly name!" Output: Howdy. What's yer name? Paris Hilton Paris Hilton ... what a silly name!

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Text processing
text processing: Examining, editing, formatting text.
Often uses loops that examine characters one by one.

A for loop can examine each character in a string in order.

Example: for c in "booyah": print c Output: b o o y a h
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Strings and numbers

ord(text) - Converts a string into a number.
Example: ord("a") is 97, ord("b") is 98, ... Characters use standard mappings such as ASCII and Unicode.

chr(number)

- Converts a number into a string.

Example: chr(99) is "c"

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Exercise
Write a program that "encrypts" a secret message by shifting the letters of the message by 1:
e.g. "Attack" when rotated by 1 becomes "buubdl"

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What's Next?

Further programming
What do students learn next?
Arrays, data structures Objects and object-oriented programming Algorithms: searching, sorting, recursion, etc. Graphical user interfaces, drawing, event-driven programming

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CSE 142 Homework

Our homeworks process interesting data and text

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Student pictures
Around the 3rd week, we assign a graphical program Two parts:
draw a particular figure using loops and parameters draw any figure you want
figures posted on course web site and voted on by students

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Critter simulation
Students write several small classes to represent animals in a simulation world Each student writes a custom "Husky" animal with their choice of behavior The best huskies compete in a tournament for prizes

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Facebook integration

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Links
Python for math teachers:
http://showmedo.com/videos/series?id=101

Physics and 3D in Python:

http://showmedo.com/videos/series?name=pythonThompsonVPythonSeries

Handbook of the Physics Computing Course (Python):

http://www-teaching.physics.ox.ac.uk/computing/handbook_Python/handbook_Python.html

Biopython - Python tools for biology:

http://biopython.org/wiki/Main_Page

Python course in Bioinformatics:

http://www.pasteur.fr/recherche/unites/sis/formation/python/index.html

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