A.N.K
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Getting Started with Python

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Basics of Python

Math

print(round(2.9))  # 3
print(abs(-2.9))  # absolute value

Variables

iq = 190
user_age = iq / 4

print(user_age, "age")  # 47.5 age

Constants

Are represented by all capital letters

PI = 3.14

Strings

print("Hello World")  # Hello World
print("Hello" + " World")  # Hello World
print("hello" * 3)  # hellohellohello
print("hello"[0])  # h
print("Hello" + str(3))  # Hello3

Escape Sequences

  • we use \ to escape a character
  • \n - new line
  • \t - tab
  • \\ - backslash
  • \" - double quote
weather = "It\'s \"kind of\" sunny"
print(weather)  # It's "kind of" sunny

Formatted Strings

We want to be able to display strings with variables in them. We can do this by adding an f before the string and then adding curly braces around the variable name.

name = "John"
age = 55
print(f"Hi {name}. You are {age} years old.")  # Hi John. You are 55 years old.

# or

print("Hi {}. You are {} years old.".format(name, age))

String Indexes

String is memory are stored as a sequence of characters. We can access each character by using an index. The first character has an index of 0.

selfish = "me me me"
print(selfish[0])  # m
print(selfish[1])  # e
print(selfish[2])  # space

We can also use a range of indexes to get a substring.

selfish = "me me me"
print(selfish[0:2])  # me
print(selfish[0:5])  # me me
print(selfish[0:])  # me me me

numbers = "0123456789"
print(numbers[0:])  # 0123456789
print(numbers[::2])  # 02468 # every second number
print(numbers[:5])  # 01234 # up to firth index

You can use negative indexes to start from the end of the string.

numbers = "0123456789"
print(numbers[-1])  # 9
print(numbers[-2])  # 8

## reverse a string
print(numbers[::-1])  # 9876543210

This works like so: string[start:end:step]

  • if there is no start index, it will start at the beginning
  • if there is no end index, it will go to the end
  • if there is no step, it will go by 1
  • if there is no start or end index, it will go by 1 (default behaviour)

Immutability

Is the concept of not being able to change a string. We can't change a character in a string. We can only create a new string. You can not reassign part of a string.

For example, you can't do this:

greeting = "Hello"
greeting[0] = "J"  # TypeError: 'str' object does not support item assignment

You can only do this:

greeting = "Hello"
greeting = "J" + greeting[1:]
print(greeting)  # Jello

Built-in Functions and Methods

List of built in functions: https://docs.python.org/3/library/functions.html

For example, len() is a built-in function that returns the length of a string.

Tell us how many characters are in a string.

greeting = "Hello"
print(len(greeting))  # 5

numbers = "123456789"
print(len(numbers)) # 9

Methods have a dot after the variable name. They are functions that are built into the variable type.

List of string methods: https://www.w3schools.com/python/python_ref_string.asp

We can use the upper() method to convert a string to uppercase.

quote = 'to be or not to be'
print(quote.upper())
# TO BE OR NOT TO BE

Running these methods will NOT mutate the original string. They will return a new string. Howerver, we can reassign the variable to the new string.

quote = 'to be or not to be'
print(quote.upper())
# TO BE OR NOT TO BE

print(quote)
# to be or not to be

quote2 = quote.upper()
print(quote2)
# TO BE OR NOT TO BE

Lists

Are similar to arrays in other languages. They are a collection of items.

  • They are mutable.
  • are denoted by square brackets []
  • can access items by using the index
friends = ["Kevin", "Karen", "Jim", "Oscar", "Toby"]
print(friends[0])  # Kevin
print(friends[1])  # Karen

Matrix

A matrix is a 2D list. It is a list of lists.

matrix = [
    [1, 2, 3],
    [4, 5, 6],
    [7, 8, 9]
]

print(matrix[0][1])  # 2

We can access the values in the matrix by using the indexes.

List Methods

List of list methods: https://www.w3schools.com/python/python_ref_list.asp

We can use methods like reverse() to reverse a list.

matrix = [
    [1, 2, 3],
    [4, 5, 6],
    [7, 8, 9]
]

matrix.reverse()

new_matrix = matrix

print(new_matrix)
# [[7, 8, 9], [4, 5, 6], [1, 2, 3]]