An Introduction to Interactive Programming in Python (Part 1) (Rice University)

An Introduction to Interactive Programming in Python (Part 1) (Rice University) ranks 2nd in the list of best online python courses.. An Introduction to Interactive Programming in Python (Part 1), offered by Rice University on Coursera, is the third choice for the best Python programming course. This course is intended to teach students with little to no computing background the fundamentals of creating simple interactive applications in Python, though you will need some high school mathematics background (hopefully you remember the Pythagoras theorem!).

This course differs from others in that it is project-based, encouraging you to build and research things from the ground up, which is a valuable skill for developers in the real world. A word of caution, though – this beginner course isn’t meant to be easy. The instructors say that you'll learn faster from doing hard things (which I’ve found to be true), so you’ll have to dedicate a significant amount of effort to complete the course.

What You’ll Learn

• You’ll start the course by learning how to express arithmetic expressions in Python and how to assign values to variables. You’ll see that Python can be used as a calculator!
• Next, the course introduces functions through both a programmatic and a visual perspective. This will give you an understanding on how functions work and how errors may arise from them. T
• he instructor also gives tips on how to debug your code based on the results it’s producing. You’ll learn logical and comparison operators, along with conditional statements, and use these concepts to build a rock-paper-scissor-lizard-Spock game.
• Moving on, you’ll be instructed on the basics of event-driven programming, which are essential to build games and applications. Then, you’ll learn what local and global variables are, which will culminate in you building a simple responsive graphical user interface for a number guessing game.
• You’ll learn how to process strings given by the user and draw text and shapes on a canvas. You’ll use this concept to build a digital stopwatch that’ll keep track of time to the tenths of a second.
• At the end of the course, you’ll recreate the classic game Pong in Python. Along the way, you’ll learn how to work with lists, how to read keyboard input from the user, how to draw and simulate the movement of the ping pong ball in your application, and how to keep track of who won and who lost. This will serve as testament to your ability to create applications with lots of moving parts.

How You’ll Learn

• The course is split into 5 weeks, with each week involving around seven to ten hours of material, including a weekly project. The course comes with a companion website called CodeSkulptor, where you’ll run and submit your Python scripts.

Fun Facts

• The course has 97.3k bookmarks and 3.3k reviews on Class Central.
• This course is the first of seven courses that make up the Fundamentals of Computing Specialization. Upon receiving the specialization certificate, you’ll have completed 20+ projects, including a capstone project.
• Dr. Scott Rixner, one of the course instructors, has worked and developed Python interpreters for both embedded systems and web browsers. He knows his stuff!

Rating: 4.9/5.0

Enroll here: classcentral.com/course/interactivepython1-408