Glossary
Case sensitiveInterpreting uppercase letters (capitals) as different from lowercase letters.Free open-source software (FOSS)Inclusive term that covers both free software and open-source software.Free softwareUsers have the freedom to run, copy, distribute, study, change, and improve the software.Interactive Development Environment (IDE)Contains facilities for writing and editing code as well as testing and debugging code.ModuleA text file that contains Python code.Open-source softwareRequires that the license to use the software shall not restrict any party from selling or giving away the software as a component of a larger software distribution.PackageLibrary of code modules used/accessed by programming code.Package managerA program to install libraries of code.pipA package manager that comes already installed in Python.PlatformThe combination of a device and an operating system.Platform independentSoftware that can run on most, if not all, of the latest operating systems/computing platforms.PythonAn interpreted computer programming language.Python distributionModified package that includes additional functionality. Also referred to as an alternative bundle.SyntaxA set of rules that dictates how to specify instructions of code in a programming language.
End-of-Chapter Exercises
1.1 Download and install Python on your computer by going to the website https://www.python.org/downloads/ and following the instructions that correspond to the platform that you are using.
1.2 Enter the Python command print(“Hello, World!”) at the IDLE shell command prompt on your computer after having installed Python to verify that Python was installed properly.
1.3 Using a text editor, create a text file named helloworld.py, which has the single line of code: print(“Hello, World!”)
1.4 Use the IDLE IDE to open the file helloworld.py that you created and execute the code in it.
References
Anonymous. (2018, July 21). And now for something completely different. The Economist, 428, 67–68.
Free Software Foundation. (2019). The free software definition. Retrieved from https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html
Goth, G. (2007, January/February). Sprinting toward open source development. IEEE Software, 24(1), 88–91. doi:10.1109/MS.2007.28
Levy, J. (2017, August 12). Taxi Trips [Data file]. Retrieved from https://dev.socrata.com/foundry/data.cityofchicago.org/wrvz-psew
Ligon, E. (1994, June). The development and use of a consistent income measure for the General Social Survey. GSS Methodological Report No. 64. Retrieved from http://gss.norc.org/Documents/reports/methodological-reports/MR064.pdf
Marsan, J., Pare, G., & Beaudry, A. (2012). Adoption of open source software in organizations: A socio-cognitive perspective. Journal of Strategic Information Systems, 21(4), 257–273. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jsis.2012.05.004
Open Source Initiative. (2007, March 22). The open source definition. Retrieved from https://opensource.org/docs/osd
Ozgur, C., Colliau, T., Rogers, G., Hughes, Z., & Myer-Tyson, E. (2017). MatLab vs. Python vs. R. Journal of Data Science, 15(3), 355–372.
Perkel, J. M. (2015, February 5). Pick up Python: A powerful programming language with huge community support. Nature, 518(7537), 125–126. doi:10.1038/518125a
Python Software Foundation. (2019, June 17). Python 3.7.3 documentation. Retrieved from https://docs.python.org/3/
Python Software Foundation. (2020). The Python Package Index. Retrieved from https://pypi.org/
Scacchi, W. (2004a, January/February). Free and open source development practices in the game community. IEEE Software, 21(1), 59–66. doi:10.1109/MS.2004.1259221
Scacchi, W. (2004b). When is free/open source software development faster, better, and cheaper than software engineering? Retrieved from https://www.ics.uci.edu/~wscacchi/Papers/New/Scacchi-BookChapter.pdf
Smets, J.-P. (2019). ERP5: Mission-critical ERP/CRM with Python and Zope. Retrieved from https://www.python.org/about/success/nexedi/
Smith, T. W., Davern, M., Freese, J., & Hout, M. (1972–2016). General Social Surveys, 1972–2016 [Machine-readable data file]. Chicago, IL: NORC.
Visit study.sagepub.com/researchmethods/statistics/kaefer-intro-to-python for data sets and code to accompany this text!
Descriptions of Images and Figures
Back to Figure
The web address is python.org/downloads/. The webpage is divided into two sections.
The section on the top shows six tabs: Python, PSF, Docs, PyPI, Jobs, and Community. Python is selected. The logo of Python is on the top left corner, and a search bar with go button, donate button, and socialize hyperlink are at the top right corner. This is followed by seven tabs: About, Downloads, Documentation, Community, Success Stories, News, and Events. Text reads, Download the latest version for Windows. A button labeled, Download Python 3.8.0. Looking for Python with a different OS? Python for hyperlink Windows, hyperlink Linux/UNIX, hyperlink Mac OS X, hyperlink Other. Want to help test development versions of Python? Hyperlink Prereleases, hyperlink Docker Images. Looking for Python 2.7? See below for specific releases.
Text in the section at the bottom reads, Join the official 2019 Python Developers Survey. A button is labeled Start the survey! Text continues, Looking for a specific release? Python releases by version number. This is followed by a table with four columns. The first column lists the release version, the second column lists the release date, the third column consists of the download button for each version, and the fourth column consists of a hyperlink, labeled Release Notes, for each version. The release versions and the corresponding release dates are as follows. Python 3.5.9: November 2, 2019. Python 3.5.8: October 29, 2019. Python 2.7.17: October 19, 2019. Python 3.7.5: October 25, 2019.
Back to Figure
The title displayed in the title bar at the top is Python 3.7.3 Shell. The options in the ribbon at the top are File, Edit, Shell, Debug, Options, Window, and Help. The three lines of text are as follows. Line 1: Python 3.7.3 (v3.7.3:ef4ec6ed12, Mar 25 2019, 21:26:53) [MSC v.1916 32 bit (Intel)] on win 32. Line 2: Type “help”, “copyright”, “credits” or “license()” for more information. Line 3: >>>
Back to Figure
The title displayed in the title bar at the top is Python 3.7.0 Shell. The four lines of text are as follows. Lines 1 and 2: Python 3.7.0 (v3.7.0:ibf9cc5093, Jun 26 2018, 23:26:24) [Clang 6.0 (clang-600.0.57)] on darwin. Line 3: Type “copyright”, “credits” or “license()”