This article helps you to find beginner-friendly resources to learn the most popular programming language – Python.
Why should we learn Python?
Many people now want to learn the hot programming language, i.e., Python. Some of them have a reason, and others don’t. Before going to learn any programming language, question yourself that why are you going to learn it? This question gives you some clarity. And know what you can do if you teach yourself that programming language. Most probably, those two questions provide a clear idea about the plans for learning it. It’s a good practice to know the features of programming language that you are interested to learn. And what works it can do for you? We are going to see all of them.
What is Python?
Python is a high-level, interpreted, and open-source language. Python supports both object-oriented and procedural programming paradigms.
Why is Python so popular?
Let’s see the features of Python, which make it one of the top programming languages.
English like Syntax
The syntax of Python is so comfortable for beginners. If you read the Python code, you will get the feeling of reading English. It reduced the stress of remembering the syntax. If you don’t believe me see the below code snippet. You will get to know the greatness of Python once you get into it.
Libraries
Python comes with a bulk number of built-in modules and libraries. There is an ocean of libraries for the Python programming language. Modules and libraries make the life of a programmer easier. They help to solve problems that can’t be solved with the standard features of Python.
Dynamically Typed
It’s a dynamically typed language. We don’t have to worry about the declarations of the variables in coding. If you see other programming languages like C, C++, Java, etc.., we have to declare the variables using any of the data types supported by that programming language. See example code in C language. Let’s see the same code in Python. Python will automatically take the type of the variable based on the value. It reduced a lot of time for developers. We don’t have to worry about the kind of data. Just Assign it.
Portability
Python follows the programming proverb, i.e., Code Once Run Anywhere. We can use Python on any platform. You need only Python to run any Python code. Python doesn’t care about your platform. Those are the most popular features of Python. It has a lot of other features that will help to achieve your goals in the development.
What can we do with Python?
We can use Python in most of the software fields. Let’s see the standard and most used areas of Python.
Machine Learning and Data Science
Python is preferred for machine learning and data science. We can compute complicated math equations using Python effortlessly. We have libraries like pandas, numpy, matplotlib, etc.., which help machine learning engineers and data scientists.
Web Development
There are frameworks out there for web development in Python. The most popular web frameworks for Python are Django and Flask. Django is a more robust framework than Flask. You can develop a simple website to complex web application using these frameworks. Both frameworks are beginner-friendly and easy to learn with the documentation.
Web Scraping
Web scraping is one of the main areas of Python. We can make web crawlers in Python with a library called scrapy, BeautifulSoup4, and many others for scraping the data.
Scripting
You can do literally anything to automate repetitive sysadmin tasks.
Interacting with OS (Windows, UNIX, etc.) Performing maintenance Deploying an application Website testing Downloading data
We can also use Python for GUI (Graphical User Interface) development, Games development with PyGame, Network programming, etc… You can get a chance to explore the world of Python once you get started. I hope you get an idea of why Python is getting so much popularity. A growing language like Python will have many resources (paid and free) to learn. That’s a problem for beginners like me (once). We have many options to learn Python. That’s so confusing. But don’t worry, the following are carefully curated.
Video Courses
We have many websites that provide video courses for free and fee. Let’s see the best courses from them.
Udemy
Udemy is a website that provides online video courses at a nominal price. You will find a lot of courses available to learn Python. The most beginner-friendly and less costly course is Complete Python Bootcamp: Go from zero to hero in Python 3.
You will get a completion certificate after the completion. But, it doesn’t add any value to your resume. The knowledge that you get from the course is matters, not the certificates. Go to the course and check the content and what you learn from the course. If you are satisfied with the course structure and preview videos, go for it.
edX
Introduction to Python programming is taught by Georgia Tech. It’s a certification program that can take approx five months by spending 9-10 hours a week. You are expected to learn fundamentals, control structure, data structure, objects, and algorithms.
Datacamp
Datacamp offers an introduction to Python for data science. The course content is focused on data analysis and scientific computing with NumPy.
You require to have around 4 hours to complete this course, and you can take it anytime from anywhere. You’ll learn various data science tools to store, analyze, and manipulate the data. If you are aiming for a data scientist role, then this is a must.
TalkPython Training
TalkPython training is a course that teaches Python by building projects. You can learn how to do projects in Python along with the syntax of Python. After completion of this course, you can work on your projects in Python. The course is Python Jumpstart by Building 10 Apps. The course costs $69 for lifetime access.
Before going to take any paid course, check the outline and content of the course.
YouTube Channel
A beginner-friendly Python Tutorials that is completely FREE.
Websites
Some of you may not like the video courses. If you enjoy reading, then this section is for you.
W3Schools
W3Schools is famous for web development. But in recent times, added new tutorials like Python, Java, C++, C#, etc… You can find the tutorials here. The tutorials are completely free and help you learn Python without any effort.
Programiz
The tutorials on Programiz are easy to understand and learn. We will find a lot of examples for each concept in the tutorials. It also provides an online interpreter to work with Python. You can see the course here.
Educative
Educative is a premium learning platform. You access the course here. You will learn all the basics of Python and get enough knowledge to improve your Python skills further.
After completing the basics on educative, you will find a lot of other courses to take your Python skills to the next.
Books
If you like to read books, then this section is for you. We are going to see the most popular books to learn Python.
Python Crash Course
Head First Python
Automation
This book is also available on Safari.
Learning Python
Online Python Compiler
If you wish to try out some Python Programs without downloading any compiler, we have a Geekflare Online Compiler to help you get some hands-on exercises. 😎
Conclusion
Go through the previews of any courses before getting started. It helps a lot. If you like the way that the author explains things, then go for it. We have plenty of options to learn Python. You may also refer to the official docs. As a beginner, you may feel it difficult to start with the official documentation. So, I suggest you take anyone from the mentioned list in the article. I hope you find some valuable resources to start your journey as a Python programmer. Happy Learning 🙂
