Pre-bootcamp Learner Introduction
This section is designed to teach you the basic of Python programming. You should be able to follow it even if you’ve done little or no programming before. The goal is to get to the point where you can attend the Bootcamp training course, and start to understand and write real code.
If you do have some prior programming experience, read on – there are some bits you can skip over, but don’t move too fast as there could be something you’re not so familiar with that’s worth revising!
The objective of this section is to be able to understand and use the following Python programming concepts:
- Variables and assignment
- Data Types
- Functions
- Conditional logic – the if statement
- Looping logic – the for, foreach and while statements
- Importing Packages
- Creating and calling methods and classes
- Building a simple console application
You’ll also learn the very basics of the Git version control system, and how to put the code you’ve written on GitHub.
Anything beyond this starting point is good! But the above represents the minimum you need to know in order to be able to effectively tackle the Bootcamp.
Setup
Development tools
Before beginning this preparation you will need a development machine with the following already installed – this information has been provided to your employer as technical prerequisites.
- Poetry
- Visual Studio Code (VSCode) – this is the Integrated Development Environment for which the exercise content was written, and the following VSCode extension should be installed.
Git setup
Before beginning Bootcamp, you will need to be able to upload your exercise solutions to GitHub so that your trainer can see them. To do this, you’ll need the following.
If you do not already have a GitHub account, go to GitHub and “Sign Up” for one (it’s free). It’s fine to use an existing account if you have one.
If you have never used Git before, follow GitHub’s short tutorial just to get used to the basics. You can skip over “pull requests” for now if you wish – you won’t need them until you start collaborating with other team members.
Then create a Personal Access Token (PAT) on GitHub by following this tutorial. Choose “classic” rather than “fine-grained”. Name your token something like “Python training”, give it an expiry time of at least 6 weeks and ensure it has the repo scope. Make sure to copy the token because you’ll need it to connect to GitHub in a moment.
To check that your Git installation is working properly, create a folder in which you’ll store the code you’ll write for this course (e.g., C:\Work\Training). Then in your Git client run a version of the following command:
git clone https://git@github.com:YourName/YourProject.git
You’ll need to replace YourName by your GitHub account name, and YourProject by the name of one of your GitHub repositories (you should have at least one if you’ve followed the tutorial on GitHub). The easiest way to get a url for the git clone command is to navigate to your project in GitHub and find the green “Code” button. Click this and you should get a “Clone with HTTPS” box containing the correct URL to copy and use.
Once you run the git clone command above, you should be prompted for your GitHub login details. Instead of your password, use the PAT you created earlier.
You should find that your project is now downloaded locally into a new folder inside C:/Work/Training. We’ll explore more about how to work with Git as we progress through the course.
If you have any trouble getting the above to work, get in touch with your trainer who should be able to give you some pointers to get moving.
Pre-course content structure
This course is designed to teach you the basics of Python programming. You should be able to follow it even if you’ve done little or no programming before. The goal is to get to the point where you can attend the Bootcamp training course, and start to understand and write real code.
If you do have some prior programming experience, read on – there are some bits you can skip over, but don’t move too fast as there could be something you’re not so familiar with that’s worth revising! Make sure you complete all the exercises that we suggest, and if you find anything tricky then treat that as a prompt to revisit the reading material we suggest in more detail.
Reading Material
This course will consist of a reading section followed by an exercise. You will almost certainly find it helpful, between reading a section and doing the exercises, to copy some of the code samples from the reading and run them. Change the code slightly, and run them again, then see if the result is what you expected. Doing this every time you meet a new concept will help you to pick it up more quickly and understand it in more depth.
By the end of this course, you should have all the basics you need to start writing your own Python code. But don’t panic if it doesn’t all make sense – help is on hand if you get stuck, and once you’ve learnt the basic syntax you can come along to our Bootcamp where we’ll demystify the remaining puzzles and take your programming to the next level.
If you do already have prior experience then you’re welcome to skim over any of the reading material that you’re already confident in. But make sure you’re proud of the code you’re writing, and if you’re not completely confident then re-read the material even if it’s largely familiar.
If you get stuck or confused while working through this course then you might find these resources helpful: