Getting functional in Python programming took me about a month and I’ve several years of C++ programming experience. I feel this is ok time for experienced programmers to get started, given you have something else going on in life as well. For beginners though, learning a new programming language in a useful manner is not as casual an affair as some YouTubers and Tech bloggers would tend to suggest on the internet (looking at you people, who write the ‘learn X in 1 hour’ guides 🙄).
Computer systems need a fixed syntax and grammar which needs practice to get comfortable with. Python is easier than many other languages, but still, if you’re a beginner, you need to set aside a good amount of time learning it. People will forget to mention this when recommending books, but there are broadly two categories of programming books out there:
- 1) for experienced programmers/Web Developers, and
- 2) for beginners, with the language basics.
If you’re a beginner to programming, don’t pick the former.
If you just want to write some standalone scripts, then avoid books targeting Web Developers (Web developers would have to learn other topics, like a web framework, HTML rendering, REST APIs, etc., stuff that you can skip). I learnt it from Dive into Python, which is a bit advanced and not for you if this is the first computer language you are learning. It’s a great book though!
If you’re a beginner, just focus on the language syntax, keywords and the style of writing code. The book Byte of Python might be it for you. Or try Think Python.
Don’t try to learn by collecting tips from forums on random Python-related FAQs. It’s best if you start with a complete book. The forums will come in handy later when you have started coding and are stuck at some specific point. I haven’t studied programming through interactive online websites yet; I prefer working with native tools and find practising on the browser a bit cumbersome. It’s always better to practice coding in the environment you would be working on. Online interactive tutorials will give you a sense of accomplishment, with a quick start, but without actually building a good foundation. Having said that, there are a few good resources out there.
There are also some very good online video courses available now. “sentdex” on youtube has some awesome content.
P.S.: Python like most scripting languages uses Regular Expressions for a lot of text operations: it would help you greatly if you learn a bit of RegEx as well (You have definitely encountered some RegEx already if you’re an active computer user).
If you’re preparing for Web Development: then learning about web frameworks (ex. Django), file I/O, REST API, Databases etc. will be the next steps. Pick the advanced topics after you’ve learnt the language basics though.
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