The Python Workshop: Write Python code to solve challenging real-world problems, 2nd Edition

Gain proficiency, productivity, and power by working on projects and kick-starting your career in Python with this comprehensive, hands-on guide.

Key Features

• Understand and utilize Python syntax, objects, methods, and best practices
• Explore Python's many features and libraries through real-world problems and big data
• Use your newly acquired Python skills in machine learning as well as web and software development

Book Description

Python is among the most popular programming languages in the world. It's ideal for beginners because it's easy to read and write, and for developers, because it's widely available with a strong support community, extensive documentation, and phenomenal libraries – both built-in and user-contributed.

This project-based course has been designed by a team of expert authors to get you up and running with Python. You'll work though engaging projects that'll enable you to leverage your newfound Python skills efficiently in technical jobs, personal projects, and job interviews. The book will help you gain an edge in data science, web development, and software development, preparing you to tackle real-world challenges in Python and pursue advanced topics on your own. Throughout the chapters, each component has been explicitly designed to engage and stimulate different parts of the brain so that you can retain and apply what you learn in the practical context with maximum impact.

By completing the course from start to finish, you'll walk away feeling capable of tackling any real-world Python development problem.

What you will learn

• Write efficient and concise functions using core Python methods and libraries
• Build classes to address different business needs
• Create visual graphs to communicate key data insights
• Organize big data and use machine learning to make regression and classification predictions
• Develop web pages and programs with Python tools and packages
• Automate essential tasks using Python scripts in real-time execution

Who this book is for

This book is for professionals, students, and hobbyists who want to learn Python and apply it to solve challenging real-world problems. Although this is a beginner's course, you'll learn more easily if you already have an understanding of standard programming topics like variables, if-else statements, and functions. Experience with another object-oriented program, though not essential, will also be beneficial. If Python is your first attempt at computer programming, this book will help you understand the basics with adequate detail for a motivated student.

Table of Contents

1. Python Fundamentals – Math, Strings, Conditionals, and Loops
2. Python Data Structures
3. Executing Python – Programs, Algorithms, and Functions
4. Extending Python, Files, Errors, and Graphs
5. Constructing Python – Classes and Methods
6. The Standard Library
7. Becoming Pythonic
8. Software Development
9. Practical Python - Advance Topics
10. Data Analytics with pandas and NumPy
11. Machine Learning
12. Deep Learning with Python
13. New Features in Python

Corey Wade, M.S. Mathematics, M.F.A. Writing & Consciousness, is the founder and director of Berkeley Coding Academy where he teaches Machine Learning and AI to teens from all over the world. Additionally, Corey chairs the Math Department at Berkeley Independent Study where he has received multiple grants to run after-school coding programs to help bridge the tech skills gap. Additional experiences include teaching Natural Language Processing with Hello World, developing Data Science curricula with Pathstream, and publishing statistics and machine learning models with Towards Data Science, Springboard, and Medium.

Mario Corchero Jiménez is a senior software developer at Bloomberg. He leads the Python infrastructure team in London, enabling the company to work effectively in Python and building company-wide libraries and tools. His professional experience is mainly in C++ and Python, and he has contributed some patches to multiple Python open source projects. He is a PSF fellow, having received the Q3 2018 PSF Community Award, is vice president of Python Espaa (the Python Spain association), and has served as Chair of PyLondinium, PyConES17, and PyCon Charlas at PyCon 2018. Mario is passionate about the Python community, open source, and inner source.

Andrew Bird is the data and analytics manager of Vesparum Capital. He leads the software and data science teams at Vesparum, overseeing full-stack web development in Django/React. He is an Australian actuary (FIAA, CERA) who has previously worked with Deloitte Consulting in financial services. Andrew also currently works as a full-stack developer for Draftable Pvt. Ltd. He manages the ongoing development of the donation portal for the Effective Altruism Australia website on a voluntary basis. Andrew has also co-written one of our bestselling titles, "The Python Workshop".

Dr Lau Cher Han is a Chief data scientist, and currently the CEO of LEAD, an institution that provides programs on data science, full stack web development, and digital marketing. Well-versed in programming languages: JavaScript, Python, C# and so on he is experienced in web frameworks: MEAN Stack, ASP.NET, Python Django and is multilingual, speaking English, Chinese, Bahasa fluently. His knowledge of Chinese spreads even into its dialects: Hokkien, Teochew, and Cantonese.

Graham Lee is an experienced programmer and writer. He has written books including Professional Cocoa Application Security, Test-Driven iOS Development, APPropriate Behaviour and APPosite Concerns. He is a developer who's been programming for long enough to want to start telling other people about the mistakes he's made, in the hope that they'll avoid repeating them. In his case, this means having worked for about 12 years as a professional. His first programming experience can hardly be called professional at all: as it was in BASIC, on a Dragon 32 microcomputer.