Programming for Everybody (Getting Started with Python)

Before you read this review, some notes about me (so you can form your own opinion about my review below):

- I have been interested in programming since I was little, but never gained any real experience in it until my adult life.
- I tried to take a Java course in college my freshman year and I struggled and had to drop out and ended up getting a degree something completely unrelated to computer science or math.
- I have a difficult time with the sometimes very "stuffy"/pretentious parts of formal academia at the university level (and many opinions about modern education :) )
- In my mid-20s I tried to teach myself C++ and struggled. Then I found Python and made it to defining a CLASS, but gave up because it was too hard. I decided to start over again with this course on Coursera (years later)

My review:

Section 1: At first I was very put off by Charles Severance's teaching and video lectures. This is because the first section of this course (7 sections) has nothing to do with teaching Python, but talking about machine language and computer functionality in general. I was eager to start Python, and I was not interested in the subject matter he was discussing (which by chance I already knew a lot about), and it seemed as though he recorded the lecture in 1 take with no formal notes or organization around the lectures - mostly just ramblings that I found hard to relate to anything Python-specific. This greatly disappointed me and I almost gave up.

DON'T GIVE UP. KEEP MOVING TO SECTION 2.

Sections 2-7: I had previously already taught myself everything this full 7 section course offers, so nothing came as a complete surprise. This is also my first course on coursera so I did not realize until around section 5 that we were supposed to read the chapter from Charles' book (which is free) Python for Everybody: Exploring Data Using Python 3 and then view the lectures. If you have never programmed before I recommend that you read these chapters first and then watch the lectures. If you have programmed before, you can skip the reading and watch the lectures until you hit material that is more challenging and then I recommend reading the chapter and following all of the exercises. As the material became more difficult it became more interesting and I grew to enjoy and appreciate the down-to-earth style that Charles has when teaching a concept in the course. I believe that he may be the person who can help me understand how to properly execute classes with functions in my coding.

The course was easy (I expected this), and I was only truly challenged on the last section (where the homework took me more than 5-10 mins to complete).

I look forward to the next section of this 5 part Python for Everybody course on Coursera, where I expect to be more challenged than in the first part (Getting Started with Python).

Thanks for reading this and I hope it helps others.

This is a great course. The teacher not only knows his material, but has a lot of experience working with first time programmers and so knows what errors they are likely to make and what questions they are likely to ask and addresses them all. He is fun to listen to, unlike some moocs I have taken where the teachers were reading and got the intonation all wrong--very distracting. This one wasn't like that by far. He was interesting and even funny at times. The only issue I have is that if you are auditing the class, it isn't as nice an experience. You can't submit quizzes to see if you got them right and all your coding problems are marked wrong. You can still do the coding and the website will error check and all, but you won't get the pass/fail grade to be sure you got it right. I worked through all the materials, including reading the chapters in the book in just four days. I'd say there is about 2 to 4 hours of work per "week" expected. So, great course, but Coursera has become more interested in making money than in those of us who must only audit. It is not worth my time to chase up financial aid for something I'm working through so quickly. I'd rather spend the time working on a portfolio for future work than to bother about all that. I'm disabled, so I have no money to through at the problem. So, if you can only audit the class, is it worth it? YES! Just prepared to be highly annoyed with Coursera. The problem isn't the instructor's fault and I'm glad to have the materials. The videos covers what's in the book, but in an easy to understand way, so when you read the chapter associated with it, you can follow along without it being too dry or laborious. Then you are ready for the quiz and coding problem(s), and then a little wrap up material before moving on to the next lesson. I'm glad we are allowed to work ahead. I'm moving on to the second course in the specialization, which picks up where this one left off. If you want to learn Python or just "a" programing language to get a start or just dabble in programming, this is a great place to start!

To be honest, I thought the course stumbled and fell short. It was far too basic and slow paced. Considering how little is taught, even for a beginner's course in Python, it could hardly be described as college-level material.
The tone was a bit immature at times, and perhaps appropriate for a grade school level classroom--not something for college students or working professionals. Even if the goal were to teach those having absolutely no programming experience, the course could accomplish that while providing more content by doing the following: keep up the pace of the lectures, give better (more relevant) coding examples, and remove the portions of the lectures that are irrelevant to the course objectives.
Is the course worth the price? Hell no. If you do pay, you may feel very cheated at the end. The entire course can be reduced to 3 pages of notes. One would be better off checking into other free, online tutorials.
I'm not sure about the value of all of the videos titled "Office Hours." They look like nothing more than self-promotional behavior from the professor, as if to say, "hey look how great I am making this irrelevant two-minute video in Paris." They're really nothing more than that.

In one video, Severance corners a guest speaker at a conference, who appears annoyed after a few minutes and gives a polite brush-off: "other people here would like to speak with me too." It's obvious that Severance didn't set up the interview beforehand or warn the other person that he was going to be videotaped. Things like that make the professor look naive, unprepared, and unprofessional. After all of these videos, you will ask yourself, "okay, why did Severance make me watch that?" "What was the point?" And you'll shrug your shoulders and say, "gee, thanks for wasting my time … again."

I work in lesson design and blended learning teacher training. I train teachers how to combine effective teaching practices with technology in K-8 classrooms. There is lots of room for improvement in this course. I would not recommend it to someone with no experience. I have no experience in coding, and did well in this course because I went to other sources to answer my questions and fill the knowledge gaps in this course. Though the instructor was great. He seems very passionate.

From a teaching/pedagogy standpoint the scope and sequence was poor. It went from extremely broad (defining computer parts) to hyper specific (defining variables in python) really quick. There was no information between on the practical pieces of what python is, what it looks like on our computer, and how we interact with it.

It feels like multiple people got together to build the course, but after it was finished they never came back to say “Here’s where we didn’t communicate, let’s edit these things.”

There is a HUGE disconnect between writing python programs and running them vs. running the actual python platform and typing commands line by line. The most frustrating thing was that every example in the course was given as a line of code in the python platform with the chevron prompt, and every single assignment was about writing a program in the text editor and the running the program. I didn’t realize these were two completely different things until about week 6. PLEASE ADDRESS THIS. Make it clear for future students that this is a thing. Go over how to use both, and the benefits and drawbacks of each. Make it clear that your examples are taking place in the command line python platform, but our homework is writing programs and saving and running them. I didn’t understand the use of the ‘type’ function until I realized this discrepancy. This was so confusing.

Some of the quiz questions were very specific questions that were mentioned for about a second or never explicitly made clear. Some of the ideas that were emphasized or mentioned multiple times in the same lecture video (seemed important) were never asked on the quiz. I can give examples of both.

I learned some stuff, but overall I would not recommend this course without pointing to the discrepancies. I would say there are multiple obvious areas for improvement and multiple gaps in knowledge that I filled from other sources. I could give more specific examples, but I feel like I already wrote quite a bit.

DON'T GIVE UP SO SOON. KEEP ON MOVING TO COURSE 2 OF THIS SPECIALIZATION.

Sections 1-7: I had no previous knowledge about programming, even my educational background doesn't related to computer science at all. I have passion for working on the computer as a graphic designer as well as website designer, I thought I must have knowledge of programming language in order to ease my work as a website designer, but everything in this full 7 section course offers me the basic knowledge of programming with python, so nothing came as a complete surprise, that's why I mustn't quit so soon, I need to proceed to the next course to have viable workable experience in this specialization.

This is also my first course on coursera so I did not realize until around section 3 that we were supposed to read the chapter from Charles' book (which is free) Python for Everybody: Exploring Data Using Python 3 and then view the lectures. If you have never programmed before I recommend that you read these chapters first and then watch the lectures. If you're a programmer, you can skip the reading and watch the lectures until you hit material that is more challenging and then I recommend reading the chapter and following all of the exercises for the beginners.

In my own opinion Dr. Chuck is a great lecturer although he somehow seems to be funny sometimes but I really interested in this course because of him. If everyone of the lecturer happen to be like him even an academic challenged individual can easily master the subject matter. All the topics of discussion were explicitly stated. All the videos were well organised in a logical manner. As the material became more difficult it became more interesting and I grew to enjoy and appreciate the down-to-earth style that Dr. Chuck has when teaching a concept in the course. I believe that he may be the person who can help me realize my dream in programming and understand how to properly execute classes with functions in my coding.

The course was easy (I expected this), and I was only truly challenged on the last section of the course where the homework took me more than 5-10 mins to complete. Anyway, I was astonished when I got it later.
I'm looking forward to the next section of this 5 part specialization of Python for Everybody course on Coursera, where I expect to be more challenged than in the first part (Getting Started with Python).

Thanks for reading this and I hope it will be of help to you.

With so many glowing reviews, I don't think mine matters, but here it is anyway: This course is amazing.

This course is so amazing that a) I realized I threw away way too much money on a different "introduction to python" course that had live instructors and one-on-one access to mentors because this class was free and far more beneficial; and b) when I'm done writing this review, I'm going to sign up for the whole Coursera Python for Everybody specialization.

The Python playground is amazing, but it isn't even necessary because the instructor provides such great material for getting Python installed and running on your computer (with windows, mac, and linux instructions), even a complete beginner would be able to follow the instructions and make a functioning script in no time. But the playground is just a lot of fun to play with, and makes tinkering as a beginner super easy.

I spent one whole day and finished the entire Getting Started with Python course (auditing, no quizzes), and learned more than I learned in the first 4 weeks of a 6 week paid course. Dr. Chuck is GOOD at what he does. He presents material in a very down-to-earth manner in clear, plain language that's technical, but not over my head. I have very little experience with programming, and know the basics of computers and computing, but even the introduction to hardware architecture was fascinating and I learned more about hardware than I expected. I felt a lot more prepared to dive into programming after that lecture.

The amazing thing is that so much is crammed into such short lectures, and yet the material is still accessible.

Speaking of accessibility: the lectures have captions AND interactive transcripts. The audio is crisp and clear, as is the video-- without background noise or distractions. The dedication to accessibility has blown me away and is another big reason I plan to support Coursera by paying for the specialization path.

I really enjoyed the online course. I thought it was well planned and layed out, easy for me to follow. The work load(h.w. & test)was just enough, so i could finish everything with enough time, learn about the topics and not feel over loaded and rushed.



Overall I really like this class because all lectures, assignments, and tests are straight forward. A couple things I dislike about the class are that there should be more opportunities for extra credit and it would be awesome if the final was an objective essay about what we have learned in this class or what we like about the class. I believe that I have more knowledge about ocean, weather, and marine lives and hopefully, I can use them in real life.



The course was everything you said it would be, fun but a lot of work. And it was! I enjoyed the web-labs because they were a lot of fun and easy to understand. And the answers were usually somewhere in the text. I also liked the assignments that required us to get online. Sometimes articles aside from the reading book gave me a better idea and understanding of the subject for that week. What I disliked was the short essay question because I found it difficult to explain certain concepts without introducing in some way, Ideas from the course notes or book (keeping in mind plagiarism). I never expected to learn so much from an online class; I now see the ocean life in a whole new way. I know I could have done better, but in the end I learned that an online class could be as much work or more than a regular class. However, I still enjoyed it very much.



I really enjoyed this class and the format it was presented in. For me, I learn and retain much more through an online class due to the fact you can do the course as an ¡§open book.¡¨ This really makes me search for the answer and in return, I retain more information. I found it relaxing to be able to turn the work on the assignments and test at my leisure and when I had the time. I liked the fact you were very clear that more internet research may be necessary for some assignments To be honest, there is nothing that I disliked about the course. I will definitely be taking another online course from you!



To be honest , this was my first online class. I am looking forward to taking more online classes. The experience of this class has being nothing but positive. I thought the coarse outline/power point was extremely helpful. The homework, quizzes and test were reasonable. I would have enjoyed experiencing a field trip to Carlsbad or Oceanside, my only suggestion would be to have more days available for those who cannot make it on the specific time/day. Maybe a field trip later in the day? Or another weekend? I have to say this class made me more aware of current event dealing with the ocean and weather. I also did something for the first time as a north county resident, I participated in the annual grunion run in Carlsbad. Lots of fun!!! Enjoy the summer Mr.T.



I really liked learning about the tide pools and local labs. Originally I enrolled in this class because I am not from CA or even a coastal areas ( I am from WI) so I thought it would be good to learn a little about the waves, swells and currents as I venture into the water a little more the longer I have lived here. I had no idea the depth of the earth’s oceans or the importance of them. I really liked the online option of this class because I am a very busy person (2 jobs and college). The only thing that was a little confusing at first was all the different resources. In the beginning I had a hard time finding the answers to questions because I wasn’t sure where to look. The book, Notes, PowerPoint presentations, web-labs, the cd with the book… Just was a little much but as the semester progressed I got the feel of it and benefited from all the information

Pros: The instructor is very passionate and knows code inside and out. I truly believe he did his best to teach students basic Python language. I'm not convinced he is well equipped to teach beginner Python courses in the "real" world....let alone an online course with no real feedback, tutors or interactive assignments along the way. You WILL learn basic Python language, but I'm quite confident most students will not be able to accurately write code upon completion of the certification.

Cons: My biggest complaint is the fact that there is that there is no real tutoring available. Nobody to talk to one-on-one and students helping students is strictly prohibited. Several students attempted to help me and they promptly got their hands slapped with the threat of breaking the "Honor Code." Too bad the tutors were not this prompt when we asked for help with our code. It takes them days to reply.... ugh. Discussions in the public forum is the only source of communication available to the students to my knowledge. This is where Coursera fails miserably. Coupled with the fact that all of the assignments are directly inline with the course material.... until the very last one. I easily passed every quiz and assignment until 5.2. The discussion threads for this particular week are double and triple all the other threads for a reason. They have strategically built your confidence along the way to send you the subliminal message that "You can do this!" In assignment 5.2 they make it nearly impossible to complete. After spending only a few weeks (and incidentally only $50) up until the very last assignment, I ended up spending an additional $150 before I finished 5.2. At least I wasn't the only sucker....I was so frustrated I literally gave up for 60 days due to the holidays, stress at home, my whole family contracting COVID, etc, etc. In the end, I merely had to change the order of the input to get my code to give the correct output. How is this possible? My code is either right or wrong. I shouldn't be able to change the order of the input to get the correct output and code to ultimately get a passing grade. There is a glitch somewhere in your grading system. A little ironic for a professional coding class if you ask me. In an earlier assignment I knew my code was right, but I was not getting the correct output. Out of sheer desperation, I highlighted my code, copied it, cleared the assignment board, went back to the home screen, refreshed the page, went back into the assignment portal, pasted the EXACT code that was there earlier, clicked the tab "CHECK CODE" and the output miraculously worked. Yet another glitch.

Before I began the course, I was so eager to learn Python. To be quite honest, this course has turned me off. I would not recommend this course to anyone. I would strongly recommend enrolling in an in-person class or an online class with a tutor who is available at all times.

I'm a UofM grad with a BSEE degree and worked has a hardware engineer for about 10 years before becoming a stay-at-home mom for the past 16. With my sights set on slowly making my way back into the workforce, Python sounded like a good stepping stone. It's been almost 30 years since I did much programming while at UM so this course was the perfect refresher course. Since it's geared towards people with absolutely no programming experience what-so-ever, I found it to be pretty easy but not boring at all.

Professor Severance did an amazing job teaching this class and I wish I had a professor like him when I was a student at UofM. He's obviously very knowledgeable on this topic but also very charismatic, funny and kept the course interesting.

The exercises were just right and I was really impressed by the Playground and how much effort it must have taken to put together such a polished course. This is only my second Coursera course, but my favorite so far. Looking forward to finishing up the Python for Everyone Specialization!

Most of the low reviews are from people who are not the target audience of this Specialization. If you already have a background in programming or impatient, this isn't for you. This is meant to be a complete INTRO class specialization.

The teacher is super knowledgeable, but doesn't let that get in the way of knowing his audience. He understands we're beginners, and even in his passionate rambling about real world applications (or movies) it never goes beyond a beginner level of understanding. In fact, those passionate ramblings just make the subject SO much more approachable and him more human for it.

So many programming classes I've taken where the teacher was passionate, but they didn't understand that they were living within muscle memory and skipping over nuances that beginners don't have. They operated with a level of assumption that had forgotten how they were when they were just dipping their toes into code.

I'm so grateful for this class and I am grateful for a teacher that understands knowledge is power and it should be accessible to all!

The instructor is awesome and the designing of course is fabulous and super easy to understand. I found this course great. I will suggest who want to learn Python Must must take this Course. It will help you lot and clear all your basics.I refer all my beloved friends and juniors to take this course. ...........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................THANK YOU

I really enjoyed the online course. I thought it was well planned and layed out, easy for me to follow. The work load(h.w. & test)was just enough, so i could finish everything with enough time, learn about the topics and not feel over loaded and rushed.

Overall I really like this class because all lectures, assignments, and tests are straight forward. A couple things I dislike about the class are that there should be more opportunities for extra credit and it would be awesome if the final was an objective essay about what we have learned in this class or what we like about the class. I believe that I have more knowledge about ocean, weather, and marine lives and hopefully, I can use them in real life.

The course was everything you said it would be, fun but a lot of work. And it was! I enjoyed the web-labs because they were a lot of fun and easy to understand. And the answers were usually somewhere in the text. I also liked the assignments that required us to get online. Sometimes articles aside from the reading book gave me a better idea and understanding of the subject for that week. What I disliked was the short essay question because I found it difficult to explain certain concepts without introducing in some way, Ideas from the course notes or book (keeping in mind plagiarism). I never expected to learn so much from an online class; I now see the ocean life in a whole new way. I know I could have done better, but in the end I learned that an online class could be as much work or more than a regular class. However, I still enjoyed it very much.

I really enjoyed this class and the format it was presented in. For me, I learn and retain much more through an online class due to the fact you can do the course as an ¡§open book.¡¨ This really makes me search for the answer and in return, I retain more information. I found it relaxing to be able to turn the work on the assignments and test at my leisure and when I had the time. I liked the fact you were very clear that more internet research may be necessary for some assignments To be honest, there is nothing that I disliked about the course. I will definitely be taking another online course from you!

To be honest , this was my first online class. I am looking forward to taking more online classes. The experience of this class has being nothing but positive. I thought the coarse outline/power point was extremely helpful. The homework, quizzes and test were reasonable. I would have enjoyed experiencing a field trip to Carlsbad or Oceanside, my only suggestion would be to have more days available for those who cannot make it on the specific time/day. Maybe a field trip later in the day? Or another weekend? I have to say this class made me more aware of current event dealing with the ocean and weather. I also did something for the first time as a north county resident, I participated in the annual grunion run in Carlsbad. Lots of fun!!! Enjoy the summer Mr.T.

I really liked learning about the tide pools and local labs. Originally I enrolled in this class because I am not from CA or even a coastal areas ( I am from WI) so I thought it would be good to learn a little about the waves, swells and currents as I venture into the water a little more the longer I have lived here. I had no idea the depth of the earth’s oceans or the importance of them. I really liked the online option of this class because I am a very busy person (2 jobs and college). The only thing that was a little confusing at first was all the different resources. In the beginning I had a hard time finding the answers to questions because I wasn’t sure where to look. The book, Notes, PowerPoint presentations, web-labs, the cd with the book… Just was a little much but as the semester progressed I got the feel of it and benefited from all the information

I really enjoyed the online course. I thought it was well planned and layed out, easy for me to follow. The work load(h.w. & test)was just enough, so i could finish everything with enough time, learn about the topics and not feel over loaded and rushed.

Overall I really like this class because all lectures, assignments, and tests are straight forward. A couple things I dislike about the class are that there should be more opportunities for extra credit and it would be awesome if the final was an objective essay about what we have learned in this class or what we like about the class. I believe that I have more knowledge about ocean, weather, and marine lives and hopefully, I can use them in real life.

The course was everything you said it would be, fun but a lot of work. And it was! I enjoyed the web-labs because they were a lot of fun and easy to understand. And the answers were usually somewhere in the text. I also liked the assignments that required us to get online. Sometimes articles aside from the reading book gave me a better idea and understanding of the subject for that week. What I disliked was the short essay question because I found it difficult to explain certain concepts without introducing in some way, Ideas from the course notes or book (keeping in mind plagiarism). I never expected to learn so much from an online class; I now see the ocean life in a whole new way. I know I could have done better, but in the end I learned that an online class could be as much work or more than a regular class. However, I still enjoyed it very much.

I really enjoyed this class and the format it was presented in. For me, I learn and retain much more through an online class due to the fact you can do the course as an ¡§open book.¡¨ This really makes me search for the answer and in return, I retain more information. I found it relaxing to be able to turn the work on the assignments and test at my leisure and when I had the time. I liked the fact you were very clear that more internet research may be necessary for some assignments To be honest, there is nothing that I disliked about the course. I will definitely be taking another online course from you!

To be honest , this was my first online class. I am looking forward to taking more online classes. The experience of this class has being nothing but positive. I thought the coarse outline/power point was extremely helpful. The homework, quizzes and test were reasonable. I would have enjoyed experiencing a field trip to Carlsbad or Oceanside, my only suggestion would be to have more days available for those who cannot make it on the specific time/day. Maybe a field trip later in the day? Or another weekend? I have to say this class made me more aware of current event dealing with the ocean and weather. I also did something for the first time as a north county resident, I participated in the annual grunion run in Carlsbad. Lots of fun!!! Enjoy the summer Mr.T.

I really liked learning about the tide pools and local labs. Originally I enrolled in this class because I am not from CA or even a coastal areas ( I am from WI) so I thought it would be good to learn a little about the waves, swells and currents as I venture into the water a little more the longer I have lived here. I had no idea the depth of the earth’s oceans or the importance of them. I really liked the online option of this class because I am a very busy person (2 jobs and college). The only thing that was a little confusing at first was all the different resources. In the beginning I had a hard time finding the answers to questions because I wasn’t sure where to look. The book, Notes, PowerPoint presentations, web-labs, the cd with the book… Just was a little much but as the semester progressed I got the feel of it and benefited from all the information

This was my first MOOC so I went in with an open mind and no expectations. I had absolutely no dev experience so I was looking for an online course that was truly for beginners.

The course consists of an eBook and online videos/assignments/quizzes. The professor Dr. Charles Severance is passionate about Python and enthusiastic about sharing his knowledge. He is engaging in the online lectures. In addition to the lectures, he also adds interviews and other relevant video clips - these extras made me feel like I was truly a part of this course.

The assignments/quizzes are due on a weekly basis and must be completed by Sunday evening. I felt this helped me hold myself accountable - even when I had things going on, I prioritized getting my assignment and quiz in prior to Sunday.

I enjoyed this course so much that I've decided to complete the entire Coursera Learn to Program and Analyze Data with Python Specialization.

To provide some perspective and context, I am a newly graduated college student, and decided to do this course during my holidays waiting for university to start. I decided to do the audit free version of this Beginner Python course, but managed to find the locked assignment questions and the answers to the quizzes and assignments by searching online to try and practice what was taught myself - since audit learners do not get their work marked online. Aside from attempting to learn a little programming basics through a programming basics website where I learnt a little Javascript a few years ago which I'd mostly forgotten by now, I have no prior programming knowledge. I completed this course in about a week.

Positives:
I felt that the course lectures were very easy to get into and understand easily as the course instructor used analogies and examples to teach the concepts. I found the quizzes and assignments manageable - I was largely able to attempt them with minimal reference to my own notes that I took down during lectures. The course materials were also made available easily for reference when I needed to take a little more time to digest the content given. There's also a more detailed book written, this will likely be very helpful for complete beginners to transition between the beginning more vague, broader overview lessons to the more intense ones which dive straight into the programming.

Negatives:
Not having much experience with online courses, I am not sure if this course is worth paying for. Personally, I think getting a certificate for this course would be more for oneself to look back on as a personal achievement rather than to use in a resume for job applications.

I do, however, get the impression that the objective of this beginner course is to make such programming knowledge more widely accessible and available instead of a for-profit aim. I feel that much effort has been put into making the basic concepts of programming very clear, from the lecturer's explanations to the range of materials available. While I have not used this feature yet, there is the option to ask any queries in the discussion forum to clarify any doubts regarding the course content, ask for help regarding technical difficulties, etc.

Hence, for those already with programming background, they might find this course a little too basic and slow-paced as this course feels very specifically tailored for beginners to programming.

Overall, I would definitely recommend this course to any beginners to programming to learn the fundamentals. (I'll also be moving on to the next course in the series myself!) For those already with programming background or those hoping to do a course to get a certificate for resume purposes, they might perhaps want to consider other more advanced/professional python courses.

I joined this course to achieve two things: to learn about learning online in a MOOC environment, and to get an early grip on Python. I have some experience with PHP but find that PHP is excruciatingly slow for the development of database-driven web sites. Don't misunderstand me - my programming background is modest and largely comprised of working with Visual Basic for Applications, behind Microsoft Access databases. MS Access is absolutely NOT the right environment for web site implementation and Python called me in the night ... one night about eight days ago.

There are a couple of things about the MOOC environment that I want to comment on. It is great to be able to rattle through the videos - I was soon running at 1.25 or 1.50 'real time' (that is a great feature of the viewer!) and - frankly - I have no wish to spend time watching anyone sipping their coffee or straining their tea-bags. Sorry, Chuck! Having said that, pitching the examples at a simple level clearly exercises the features of programming (and the Python language) easily, and for that I am grateful. I will certainly press on to the following modules. The other thing about this MOOC environment wasHUGE frustration with the auto-grader. I found it to be very 'fragile' (that is the best word I can find to describe it) and when your code fails, it gives very poor feedback. The last exercise (5.2) I simply had to leave without a grade, because all it would tell me is '

This is a fantabulous course to get started with python.The instructor is awesome and the designing of course is fabulous and super easy to understand. I found this course great. I will suggest who want to learn Python Must must take this Course. It will help you lot and clear all your basics.I refer all my beloved friends and juniors to take this course. ...........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................THANK YOU

This is the first class in the new (at the time I took it) Python for Everybody specialization, which grew out of Dr. Charles Severence's popular course of the same name. As I understand it, the first two courses of this specialization will cover the material from the previous course, while the third and fourth courses and the capstone will cover new material.

This is a very gentle introduction to programming in Python. The videos are very thorough, and Dr. Chuck does a good job of going over everything he's teaching in great detail. As I had a fair amount of experience in R and some experience with Python (Codecademy course and Genomic Data Science with Python course), I found this to be very easy, and I raced through the class in a few hours, listening to the videos on 2x speed. One of the big problems I have with this course and similar ones (like the Rice Python courses) is the use of web-based coding platforms. While they're useful for real-time checking of code, students who learn to use these platforms may end up completely lost if they try to go apply their programming experience from these courses to a real-world problem. I would much prefer to see programming taught via command line or using an IDE like Spyder.

Overall, four stars. Very thorough, very slow-paced. I imagine that finishing this specialization will only get students to the novice programmer stage, but it is a good first step, and probably the most approachable programming course out there for those with no experience.