Welcome to the Learning to programme with python repository! This repository contains all the materials and resources for the course.

If you've never written a line of code but suspect programming might benefit your research, this course provides a gentle introduction through Python. Designed for complete beginners, we'll cover fundamental programming concepts, ensuring everyone builds solid foundations regardless of technical background. The course takes a hands-on approach using Jupyter notebooks to explore essential programming elements: basic data types (strings, integers, floats, booleans), variables, operators, and control flow statements including if-statements and loops. You'll learn to write functions, handle user input, read and write files, and work with data structures like lists. By the end, you'll understand how basic computer programs work, how to structure code effectively, and where to find resources for continued learning. There will be plenty of opportunities to experiment and ask questions throughout. No prior experience required, just curiosity about what programming can do.

The repository is organized as follows:

• Basics.ipynb: This file contains the course material we will be using during the course

• Basics_filled.ipynb: This file contains the completed course material, the solutions to the exercises and the speaker notes. It is meant for reference purposes for teaching the course and as a fallback if something is missing from the notes students made during teaching.

For this course we are using JupyterLite, which is a tool that allows us to launch JupyterLab and run our Python code in the web browser through the notebook (.ipynb) files contained in this repository.

To access and run the course materials, start by:

• Navigating to the course materials on our GitHub page: https://durhamarc-training.github.io/BasicProgrammingPython/

• Start by accessing Basics.ipynb notebook.

You are now ready to start the course!

NOTE: The first time you run your code/load new modules, there may be a small wait while the module(s) are loaded.

If you find any issues or have suggestions for improvement, please feel free to open an issue or submit a pull request. Contributions are welcome!

You can add the files of the common-tools github submodule by typing in git submodule update --init. Consult the README in the then filled common-tools directory for further instructions. In general you should never edit the content in the Basics.ipynb but work on Basics_filled.ipynb and have the tool generate the student notebook versions automatically as described in the common-tools README.