Comp 150 - Introduction To Computing, Online, Summer 2016

Dr. Harrington

http://connect.luc.edu/comp150/ is the URL for class meetings.

This page is the center of public information added throughout the course. Initially, please see the Course Syllabus, about course content, administration, and requirements. That page will introduce and point to the other important documents. Looking at them in the order they are introduced in the syllabus is an easy way to keep on track. Alternately, or later for reference, you can look at the sublist underneath the syllabus link below of links to the other documents.

Look at the Prep assignment due at the start of the first class!

The class meets online Monday, Wednesday, Thursday 5:30-6PM at http://connect.luc.edu/comp150/

To get used to the technology, please try to join us to get up to speed on the tools the week before the regular class:

Monday May 16 and/or Thursday May 19, at 5:30PM.

Before joining your first meeting, go over instructions and videos on the page for Adobe Connect. Particular points people have missed: earphones and a quiet space are very important.

• Course Syllabus Quick access to links more completely described in the syllabus are below:
  • Daily Reference: Schedule and Assignments
  • Python tutorial example zip download
  • Adobe Connect
  • Sakai
  • Piazza
  • Pair Programming: How to Pair Program, Administration
  • System updates before following the Python tutorial, either extra Windows notes or extra Mac notes.
  • Hands-on Python Tutorial
  • Extra material on Idle error messages
  • Class notes (first day and after Python)
  • Examples: (Referenced files to download, mostly from after Python)
  • Http://python.org Home site for the Python language, where you can find out more and download the latest production version starting with a 3 (3.5 in May 2016). Caution: an incompatible 2.7 version may be listed first in the downloads.
  • http://www.pythontutor.com/ A site where you run code in your browser step by step and save and email a URL reference to any step.
• Other Free Online References for Python. All except the official Python Tutorial are intended for people with no programming background.
  • An online interactive presentation with online exercises, covering pretty much what I do, though they do functions much later: http://cscircles.cemc.uwaterloo.ca/ They incorporate the pythontutor.com functionality referenced above.
  • There is a pdf How to Think Like a Computer Scientist and a derived, somewhat different interactive web version, and both versions start with pretty much the same basics as the Hands-on Python Tutorial, but in a somewhat different order with different graphics library, and goes further.
  • https://groklearning.com/course/intro-python-1/ : Gentle Python intro, totally in the browser!
  • http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Non-Programmer's_Tutorial_for_Python_3 Another introduction to Python basics in different words. No graphics, few major examples, lots of basic syntax.
  • Official Python 3 Tutorial moves fast for someone with no programming background. It covers a lot, going well past our course!
  • http://codecademy.com step by step, but with Python 2, not 3. Python 2 has slightly different syntax for reading from the keyboard (raw_input), printing (a statement, not a function - no parentheses), and they use an old form of division where / can mean either the // or / of Python 3, depending on the types involved.
  • Software Carpentry - Python is an intro for data scientists using the numpy library and the nice development/display environment ipython.
  • A long further list at http://wiki.python.org/moin/BeginnersGuide/Programmers