Mailman 3 June 2020 - Edu-sig

Part-time opportunities for Python instructors
by Merav Yuravlivker May 7, 2024

May 7, 2024

Hi there, My name is Merav Yuravlivker, and I'm the CEO of Data Society - we deliver data science academies to Fortune 500 companies, government agencies, and other international organizations. We're currently looking for part-time Python instructors and TAs, and my friend Jackie Kazil recommended I reach out to you and your list serv. All of these opportunities can be available for people who are employed full-time, professors, or grad students. We pay well and provide all the materials for the instructor, as well as instructor training and support. If possible, would you please be able to share the following blurb? Please let me know if there is anything else you need from me. Much appreciated! Best, Merav --- Data Society, a fast-growing data science training company, is looking for awesome Python instructors and TAs! We deliver data academies to Fortune 500 companies, government agencies, and international organizations. All of our content is built in-house by an expert team of data scientists and instructional designers, so you can focus on what you do best - teach professionals how to find new insights and make their jobs easier. We currently have a few openings for TAs, as well as part-time instructors - all of these opportunities can be available for people who are employed full-time, professors, or grad students. We pay competitively, have a great support team, and provide amazing opportunities for additional projects if you're interested. To learn more, please visit our page for current opportunities <https://t.sidekickopen10.com/s2t/c/5/f18dQhb0S7lM8dDMPbW2n0x6l2B9nMJN7t5X-F…>, or simply reach out to Merav at merav(a)datasociety.com. -- Schedule a time to meet <https://t.sidekickopen10.com/s1t/c/5/f18dQhb0S7lM8dDMPbW2n0x6l2B9nMJN7t5X-F…> Merav Yuravlivker Data Society, Chief Executive Officer and Co-founder 777 6th Street NW, 11th Floor Washington, D.C., 20001 Enterprise: solutions.datasociety.com Consumer: datasociety.com

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a short essay about programming
by kirby urner Dec. 8, 2022

Dec. 8, 2022

A common "error" (not too serious) that I see in beginning Python (and no doubt other languages, but Python is the one I'm teaching), is having a while condition that appears to put a lid on things, but then the flow all leaks away through break statements, such that the "front door" condition is never revisited. while guess != secret: guess = int(input("Guess?: ") if guess == secret: print("You guessed it!") break else: print("Nope, try again...") What's messed up about the above code is you never really go back to the top in the case where you'd get to leave. Rather, you exit by the back door, through break. So in that case, wouldn't have been simpler and more elegant, even more "correct" (dare I say it) to have gone: while True: # no ifs ands or buts guess = int(input("Guess?: ") if guess == secret: print("You guessed it!") break else: print("Nope, try again...") I see lots of heads nodding, and that could be the end of the matter, but then a next question arises: wouldn't this also be a more correct solution?: while guess != secret: guess = int(input("Guess?: ") if guess == secret: print("You guessed it!") continue # instead of break else: print("Nope, try again...") We're back to having a variable while condition, not a boolean constant, but this time we actually exit by means of it, thanks to continue or... while guess != secret: guess = int(input("Guess?: ") if guess == secret: print("You guessed it!") else: print("Nope, try again...") ... thanks to no continue. This last one is getting a thumbs up, but then I'd pause here and say "continue" can be easier on the eyes. It's unambiguous where it takes you, in contrast to having to scan on down the gauntlet, looking for possibly other open doors. "What happens next" should not require scanning ahead too far. Help us not to get lost. Be a civic-minded coder. I'm thinking of a programming style that advises two things: (a) if you use a while condition that's variable, that's expected to change, then your goal should be to always exit because of that, i.e. that should be your only exit point. Even if some other criterion suggests exiting, you have the option to flip that "lid" at the top, to crack that front door, and bounce the ball out. (b) which is why 'continue' is your friend. You are showing the user where your 'break' statements are, except you don't use "break" statements, as you've given a non-constant condition, and your aim is to make that your ONLY exit point. In short: never use break to exit a while loop unless your condition is while True. Instead, always flip the condition and exit through the font door. However, as soon as I make that rule I can think of good reasons to break it. The other programmers in the room are shaking their heads. Won't we lose information, needed elsewhere in the program, if we "artificially" force a True condition to False. Aren't we, in effect, lying? That concern could be addressed. Keep all the info true, just treat the "lid condition" (it "keeps a lid on it") as a flag. Go ahead and remember the user's guess. allowed = 5 tries = 1 exit = False while not exit: # no other way out guess = int(input("Guess?: ") if guess == secret: print("You guessed it!") exit = True # instead of break continue print("Nope, try again...") tries += 1 if tries == allowed: print("You've maxed out") exit = True continue I think we all understand the main issue: writing reader-friendly code, and rules for doing so. There's something comforting about approaching a while loop and knowing its not a leaky sieve, riddled with back doors, maybe even an exit( ) time bomb. But in the recursion world we want a minimum of two exits usually: when another round is called for versus when we've "hit bottom". Can we have it both ways? Conclusions: Lets not be too hasty with rules of thumb and: Lets keep the reader in mind when writing code. Just because the interpreter knows to compute the flow unambiguously, doesn't mean all ways of writing it are equally reader-friendly. What may seem a gratuitous gesture, an unnecessary flourish, may actually promote reader comprehension of your code, and that should be a goal as much as satisfying the interpreter. Kirby

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MineCraft with Python
by Jurgis Pralgauskis Dec. 4, 2022

Dec. 4, 2022

Hi, intro: many kids like MineCraft :) probably you know/heared of MineCraft Pi https://www.raspberrypi.org/learning/getting-started-with-minecraft-pi/ But there seems to be Py for real MC http://coderdojotc.readthedocs.io/projects/python-minecraft/en/latest/ http://www.instructables.com/id/Python-coding-for-Minecraft/ PS.: a nice article (from js4MC world) https://github.com/walterhiggins/ScriptCraft/blob/master/docs/YoungPersonsG… -- Jurgis Pralgauskis tel: 8-616 77613; Don't worry, be happy and make things better ;) http://galvosukykla.lt

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a "covid camp" specimen (online curriculum materials)
by kirby urner March 31, 2021

March 31, 2021

A Python camp for teens stuck at home. [Exhibit](https://github.com/4dsolutions/python_camp/blob/master/README.md ) (work in progress)

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python in context
by kirby urner June 26, 2020

June 26, 2020

Some history: https://www.quora.com/Is-coding-the-same-as-writing-script/answer/Kirby-Urn… Is coding the same as writing script? <https://www.quora.com/Is-coding-the-same-as-writing-script> <https://www.quora.com/profile/Kirby-Urner> Kirby Urner <https://www.quora.com/profile/Kirby-Urner> · 1h ago <https://www.quora.com/Is-coding-the-same-as-writing-script/answer/Kirby-Urn…> Founder at 4D Solutions I’d say so. Coding is the same as scripting. Writing a program is writing a script. However “scripting” has had varying connotations over the years. People spoke of Perl as a “scripting language” and the idea was a script was more likely a one-off, a quick and dirty way to get something done in a hurry, inhouse. Serious software built for the ages would not use a “scripting language”. That meaning morphed into “agile” as people (coders) realized that agile dynamically typed high level languages were indeed suitable for production code and frameworks. The Perl Mongers (Perl users) were encouraged to rehabilitate “scripting language” as a term they could use with pride. JavaScript, at first dismissed as just a mere toy inside the web browser (then a novelty), became the king of the agiles. I’d add that “coding” didn’t used to be as popular a synonym for “programming” as it is today. People used to “learn to program” not “code”. Guido van Rossum’s Computer Programming for Everybody (CP4E) initiative was prescient in that coding may now be done in snippets, in the context of a Jupyter Notebook say, by people who do not consider themselves professional programmers. Guido invented Python, another agile or “scripting language” similar to Perl and later Ruby (Ruby owes more to Perl than Python I’d say). In contrast to the high level agiles, we still have the “systems” languages that run faster once written, but take a lot longer to write (C++ being the standard example of a systems language). These days, coders are bioengineers, medical doctors, statisticians. Coding is about using one more tool. You don’t need a degree in computer science. Again, as the culture keeps changing, so do the connotations of words, even more so than the denotations. 41 views View Upvoters · Answer requested by Melonie Tuttle <https://www.quora.com/profile/Melonie-Tuttle-1>

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python in the movies...
by kirby urner June 17, 2020

June 17, 2020

I've taken a deep dive into Blender recently, you'd have thought earlier maybe, but I was slow into CAD, doing my work directly in a ray tracer (POV-Ray, also free open source). https://nbviewer.jupyter.org/github/4dsolutions/School_of_Tomorrow/blob/mas… Why not jump right into something full featured even for plotting XY graphs? Keep doing those parabolas but add texture / materials, lighting. Math as theater (a kind of art). Sure, we can do that in matlabish panda type environments but lets not forget live ray tracers with fully internalized live Python (like ESRI). Just import bpy and you have full scripting control over the GUI interface as well as hooks into all the data, the current context and on and on. The ergonomics drive the economics i.e. if every student is going to need hardware up to Blender's capabilities, with GPU(s), then we're beyond "one laptop per child" to "one (or more) well equipped workspace(s) per child" (adults need PWSs too, and many have them). The idea that school is cramped little desks close together with no room for multiple monitors is so 1900s. Kirby

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