Digital Lab Python Lessons
A shortened link to this page is vanderbi.lt/py.
About the lessons
Digital Lab Python lessons are provided by the Digital Lab of the Jean and Alexander Heard Libraries at Vanderbilt University. The Digital Lab provides regular lessons for Python beginners with a variety of followup intermediate and advanced lessons. There is no cost associated with the lessons.
The beginners lessons are generally offered at least once per semester. See the schedule below for session details.
Each lesson includes of a series of videos with a practice Jupyter notebook and homework assignments. The live sessions will demonstrate how to code the practice assignments with the assistance of GitHub Copilot, a generative AI-based plugin for VS Code.
The lessons are part of a free, online learning system called CodeGraf. You are welcome to work through these lessons or any of the other lesson modules available in CodeGraf on your own at any time (no registration required). To explore all of the lesson modules that are available, visit the CodeGraf landing page.
The Digital Lab also provides lessons for learning R and getting started with GitHub in a similar format.
Introduction to Python with GitHub Copilot - Spring 2024
Time: Tuesdays from 1:00-2:00 PM Central (US) Time (starting January 16).
Venue: In-person in the Digital Lab, 4th floor Central Library. Resistration is preferred, although walk-ins are OK. Registration link.
Instructor: Steve Baskauf. Email steve.baskauf@vanderbilt.edu to arrange a time to talk.
Important note: You should apply for free educational access to GitHub Copilot as soon as possible, since there is often a delay in getting access. See below for details.
I will be presenting the lessons using Jupyter notebooks in the Visual Studio Code (VS Code) environment. Before you come on the first day, you should do two things: apply for free educational access to GitHub Copilot and install VS Code and a Jupyter environment. There are instructions for these two tasks on the setup page. You can use either of the two options for installing a Jupyter environment. At the first lesson, we will troubleshoot any problems you had with the installation and finish the setup of VS Code to use the GitHub Copilot plugin. Copilot is generally a paid service, however, people with an academic email address have free access. So if you have a vanderbilt.edu email address, you will be able to use this feature for free. Using Copilot is not required, but it makes the coding process much easier.
If you have never programmed before, I recommend that you work through two optional lessons on your own: terminology (18 min) and programming environments (50 min). I will assume that you are familiar with the concepts and terms covered in these lessons as we work through the actual Python lessons.
| Working session date | Lesson | Topic | Web page (times are total video length) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jan 16 | 1 | Setting up and using Copilot | instructions |
| Jan 23 | 2 | Programming basics | lesson videos (67 min) |
| Jan 30 | 3 | Code libraries | lesson videos (34 min) |
| Feb 6 | 4 | List and dictionary objects | lesson videos (32 min) |
| Feb 13 | 5 | Loops | lesson videos (33 min) |
| Feb 20 | 6 | Conditional execution | lesson videos (44 min) |
Microcontrollers drop-in sessions
Time: Tuesdays from noon-1:00 PM Central (US) Time (starting January 16).
Venue: In-person in the Digital Lab, 4th floor Central Library.
If you are interested in single-board computers like Arduino or Raspberry Pi, or microcontrollers such as the QTPy, and you want to interact with people having that common interest, come by the Digital Lab during our microcontroller drop-in sessions. During those sessions we will have hardware available for you to experiment with to build your skills in these technologies. No experience is necessary!
Although this isn’t strictly Python-related, Python can be used to program the Raspberry Pi and is used to program the QTPy. So if you are interested in learning to use Python to control hardware, this is a good opportunity to do that.
For more information, contact Steve Baskauf. Email steve.baskauf@vanderbilt.edu. There are also notes and videos from a lesson series on Microcontrollers with CircuitPython.
Python Resources
Here’s a page of Python resources
O’Reilly for Higher Education books and videos (Vanderbilt sign-in required)
Other sources of Python resources on Vanderbilt’s campus
Vanderbilt Data Science Institute (DSI) https://www.vanderbilt.edu/datascience/
For more information on all DSI events, visit the DSI workshops page. .
Questions? contact Steve Baskauf
Revised 2024-01-09
Questions? Contact us
License: CC BY 4.0.
Credit: "Vanderbilt Libraries Digital Lab - www.library.vanderbilt.edu"