Mailman 3 July 2002 - Edu-sig

Use? Abuse? Amusement? Amendments?
by Gregor Lingl Aug. 22, 2002

Aug. 22, 2002

Hi! If you, incidentally, are going to have a coffee-break, please, run the code of the attachment. Your opinion? Gregor from __future__ import generators from turtle import * def ttree(t,l): if l > 12.0: t.forward(l) yield 1 t.left(25) for x in ttree(t, l * 0.65 ): yield x t.right(60) yield 1 for x in ttree(t, l * 0.52 ): yield x t.left(35) t.backward(l) yield 1 turtles = (leonardo, raphael, donatello) = (Pen(), Pen(), Pen()) for turtle in turtles: turtle.left(90) turtle.up() leonardo.goto(-100,-100) leonardo.color("red") raphael.goto( 0, -100) raphael.color("green") donatello.goto(100,-100) donatello.color("orange") for turtle in turtles: turtle.down() turtle.width(3) ltree = ttree(leonardo,79.0) rtree = ttree(raphael, 100.0) dtree = ttree(donatello, 66.0) done = 0 while done < 3: done = 0 for tree in (ltree, rtree, dtree): try: tree.next() except: done += 1 leonardo.up() leonardo.goto(-140,-135) leonardo.write("HOW CAN THIS BE DONE WITHOUT GENERATORS?") raw_input("Press Enter!")

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Who knows? Maybe someone here is interested in this...
by fotisg＠science.uva.nl Aug. 3, 2002

Aug. 3, 2002

-------- Original Message -------- Subject: presentation of the work of Fotis Georgatos; the AMSTEL institute From: gef(a)ceid.upatras.gr Date: Tue, June 18, 2002 1:23 pm To: ams(a)science.uva.nl Dear colleagues, You are cordially invited to the defence of the Masters thesis entitled: "How applicable is Python as first computer language for teaching programming in a pre-university educational environment, from a teacher's point of view?" Next Tuesday, June 25, from 14.00 till 15.30 Fotis Georgatos will present his work at the Studio Classroom, AMSTEL Institute. Fotis Georgatos is following the International Masters program "Mathematics and Science Education" organized by the AMSTEL Institute. In his case the Masters thesis is aimed at teaching a computer language, in particular Python, and what are the teachers' opinion over that. The presentation includes a discussion on * research subject setting * background work * chosen methodology * results and * conclusions Hopefully the critique over the findings of this research will be followed by a discussion on what the future concerns in teaching programming could be like. Please, do forward this announcement within your departments to possibly interested colleagues that should be aware of it. You may find the Research Report on the project's website: http://amstel.science.uva.nl/~fotisg/python/ Kind regards, Fotis Georgatos Dr. Ton Ellermeijer AMSTEL institute, Faculty of Science Universiteit van Amsterdam Kruislaan 404 NL - 1098 SM Amsterdam The Netherlands tel ++ 31 20 5257963 fax ++ 31 20 5255866

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A maybe change in CS at US
by Ludger Humbert July 31, 2002

July 31, 2002

Dear collegues, as I heard last week at the SEC III Conference Open IFIP-GI-Conference on Social, Ethical and Cognitive Issues of Informatics and ICT (Information and Communication Technologies) July 22-26, 2002 University of Dortmund, Germany e-learning media education change management didactics of informatics URL: http://seciii.cs.uni-dortmund.de/ in the talk of Harriet G. Taylor Abstract at: http://seciii.cs.uni-dortmund.de/web/it-professions.htm#taylor THURSDAY, 25th July 2002 there seems to be a possible change in curricula in the US. As she told one is able to send contributions to some commitee. I think the most interesting point is, that no longer a concret programming language is mentioned and you may tell, there are more than one paradigms, one can teach. IMHO Python is a language, which can more or less deal with all three paradigms, which should be taught ;-) URLs can be found inside the abstract Ludger Humbert

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Update from Urner
by Arthur July 28, 2002

July 28, 2002

Kirby writes - >Perhaps some other Pythoneers tracking this list have some overlap with J as well? >Anyone care to opine re J? My focus being in a sense a subset of yours - math through visualization/graphics programming - J has come into play. Working with a copy of "Fractals Visualization and J" by Clifford A. Reiter http://ww2.lafayette.edu/~reiterc/j/index.html. But have not really had the time, impetus to get into the J learning curve. As much as I agree with your multilanguage approach, I personally feel the need to get to a certain level of depth in a particular language before I can get too much out of comparative language approach. And I still don't feel as competent in Python as I would like to be. So I'm still hacking away on PyGeo in my spare time trying to get deeper into performance related issues - e.g. having a tight event loop that only updates/calculates what is necessary as necessary. Mostly stuff that I am sure would be necessary to focus on in its own way in any language I was working with/in. (Also got off the ground on what I was trying to do with complex number visualization using Visual Complex Analysis by Tristan Needham as guide/ inspiration). But I had brought up J on the list earlier and do see it as a natural extension to your executable symbolic math interest and look forward to following your adventures with it. Art

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(no subject)
by Ronald Mangaliag July 27, 2002

July 27, 2002

hi... this is my first post so please take it easy on me.... ;) i'm in the process of gathering info to suggest a change in the syllabus of our programming course here in saint louis university, philippines... i was thinking (for more than a month now) of suggesting a change in the programming language also... we're teaching C to engineering studes... and of course, the "natural tendency" is to change it to python because of the known advantages... my question is -- can you point me (url or anything) or give me a sample syllabus where we can pattern our proposal to... tnx... in advance... ali ------------------------------------------------------------ ronald ali l. mangaliag computer applications department saint louis university 2600 baguio city, philippines ------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------------------------ E-mail service provided by SLUNET Saint Louis University ( http://www.slu.edu.ph ) ------------------------------------------------

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Re: Edu-sig digest, Vol 1 #531 - 1 msg
by Mitchell L Model July 26, 2002

July 26, 2002

Just joined list and haven't taken the time to read the archives yet, so maybe this is a silly post, but I thought it worth putting out there that I will be teaching an Introduction to Programming for non-computer science majors at Wesleyan University this fall, having just taken a position there as a visiting professor. I've convinced the other Computer Science faculty involved to abandon their attempts to make this course work with C++ and Java and to use Python instead. As part of the preparation for my introducing Python at Wesleyan I put together a web page with arguments for using Python (and URLs for more), information about where to find Python tutorials, installations, additional modules, tools, books, etc., and some recommendations on how to get started for different audiences, including people new to programming, experienced programmers, and people in fields such as Biology and Chemistry who need to do some practical programming without become serious programmers. You can find this web page currently at http://homepage.mac.com/MLMConsulting/PythonStart.html. I am likely to drop this site soon and move its contents to my personal site, http://homepage.mac.com/MitchellModel/, so if you don't find it at the first URL, look for it somewhere under the second. I think I've done a pretty thorough job of exploring existing resources. Some I've omitted simply because they are too old to be of much use to people new to Python. Others because I thought the ones I listed served my purposes better. I would be delighted to hear recommendations for other books, papers, URLs, software, IDEs (especially), etc. that would be good to add to the page. I plan to use the textbook Learn to Program Using Python (http://www.aw.com/catalog/academic/product/1,4096,0201709384,00.html), with the Python Essential Reference (http://newriders.com/books/product.asp?product_id={2DF0A321-D759-44A9-8DC2-…) as an optional resource. I'll also point students to the online book How to Think Like a Computer Scientist : Learning with Python (http://www.ibiblio.org/obp/thinkCS.php). Since I'm new to the list and plan on keeping the list informed of my experiences introducing Python to the Wesleyan introductory programming course, let me point you http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?MitchellModel as one place you can find out more about me. In addition to teaching computer science courses at Wesleyan I will be working with the science faculty as part of a new interdisciplinary program in Integrative Genomics to develop and teach informatics modules for their genomics-related science courses. (You can read more about the program at http://www.wesleyan.edu/argus/archives/aa_archive_dec072001/dateyear/n2.html and http://www.wesleyan.edu/hughes/ (though the latter is two years old). I am about to install a Wiki (cf. http://homepage.mac.com/MLMConsulting/WhatsWiki.html for introductory information and links about Wiki if your not familiar with the concept or technology) at Wesleyan to facilitate interdisciplinary resource pooling, discussion, and planning. I'm tempted to use the Python-based Moin Moin implementation, but have decided on the Perl-based (sorry) TWiki because it appears to be the most mature and featureful Wiki that is freely available and can be installed and run without a lot of hands-on effort, while still being quite customizable and able to support enterprise-wide activity. I look forward to sharing my experience in these efforts and hearing opinions from others heading, or thinking of heading, in the same direction. Having taught many introductory and computer science courses in many languages to many different kinds of audiences, I find myself thinking that all undergraduate computer courses, whether for majors or not, and whatever the level, should be done in Python. (Of course I've said that about Smalltalk for many years, but Python is less of a leap for the mainstream world:-). -- Mitchell L Model Visiting Associate Professor Computer Science

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Re: Python at Wesleyan
by Louis Bertrand July 26, 2002

July 26, 2002

[replying to the digest -- look for LB: in text] Message: 7 Date: Thu, 25 Jul 2002 19:59:05 -0400 To: edu-sig(a)python.org From: Mitchell L Model <MLModel(a)wesleyan.edu> Subject: [Edu-sig] Re: Edu-sig digest, Vol 1 #531 - 1 msg --============_-1184480944==_ma============ Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" ; format="flowed" Just joined list and haven't taken the time to read the archives yet, so maybe this is a silly post, but I thought it worth putting out there that I will be teaching an Introduction to Programming for non-computer science majors at Wesleyan University this fall, having just taken a position there as a visiting professor. I've convinced the other Computer Science faculty involved to abandon their attempts to make this course work with C++ and Java and to use Python instead. LB: I applaud your efforts. I teach at Durham College, (http://www.durhamc.on.ca/) LB: and I went through the process of convincing my colleagues that Python was LB: an interesting and viable alternative to the "production" languages like LB: C++, Java and Visual Basic for the Intro to Programming course. There's LB: still a few potshots in the night but otherwise the furore has settled down :) I plan to use the textbook Learn to Program Using Python (http://www.aw.com/catalog/academic/product/1,4096,0201709384,00.html), LB: Please read this book carefully first. I used it last year and the LB: feedback I got is that it doesn't go into detail into some important LB: concepts. Also, there are few examples and no exercises, so you have LB: to supply a lot of the material yourself. Don't get me wrong, I personally LB: found it interesting, but (as the subtitle suggests) it's meant for LB: self-starters and hobbyists who learn by tinkering. I found it unsuitable LB: for a first course with a fixed timeline and the dreaded final exam at LB: the end of the term. with the Python Essential Reference (http://newriders.com/books/product.asp?product_id={2DF0A321-D759-44A9-8 DC2-1900CC090956) as an optional resource. I'll also point students to the online book How to Think Like a Computer Scientist : Learning with Python (http://www.ibiblio.org/obp/thinkCS.php). LB: I'm going to try ThinkCSpy this year, and I endorse Beazley's Reference LB: as an essential resource (my copy is under my pillow at night). LB: LB: Good luck with the course! LB:

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0 to the 0
by Lloyd Hugh Allen July 26, 2002

July 26, 2002

Urner wrote, > Question: why do both J and Python define 0**0 (or 0^0 in J) > to be 1, when mathematicians (and Wolfram's Mathematica) call > this undefined? Speaking of Wolfram, I did the simplest > cellular automata from NKS in J. Output looks like this: > http://www.inetarena.com/~pdx4d/ocn/graphics/Jnks1.png (this > is after doing similar stuff in Python -- posted about it to > this list in late May of this year). For what it's worth, often it is convenient to define 0**0 to be 1--if I recall correctly, Maple's 0**0 has a value based on context, where x**0|x=0 is one and 0**x|x=0 is zero. Straight-out 0**0 was undefined. All of this is based on a demo copy on a hard drive that no longer exists, but I seem to remember coming across that and thinking it was cool.

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[corrections]
by Mitchell L Model July 26, 2002

July 26, 2002

First all of , sorry for the subject line of my previous message -- careless mistake. Second, I found a better URL for information about Wesleyan's Integrated Genomic Sciences program: http://igs.wesleyan.edu. -- Mitchell L Model Visiting Associate Professor Computer Science

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Glad
by Will Well July 25, 2002

July 25, 2002

mid-summer på er! Larry -- Get your free email from www.linuxmail.org Powered by Outblaze

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Who knows? Maybe someone here is interested in this...
by gef＠ceid.upatras.gr July 2, 2002

July 2, 2002

Dear All, congratulations! Not only did I graduate, it has also been a nice demonstration of Python to a small but special set of people, in the Amstel Institute. You may find the presentation (and research report) here: http://amstel.science.uva.nl/~fotisg/python/ -> Thesis presentation If anyone wishes to contact me, two things: a) use the email address gef(a)ceid.upatras.gr; the other is unavailable by now b) I reply very slowly and in a sporadic way... good things need no hurry cheers, Fotis

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