Where are you along the path of learning Python? Do you feel like you’re making progress? What are ways you can put the learning path into a more precise focus? This week on the show, we talk with previous guest Martin Breuss about his recent article “How Long Does It Take to Learn Python?”

Martin discusses methods for measuring your progress and the various reasons for learning the language. We talk about how different backgrounds will affect your approach. We also suggest resources to help you on your path.

We share a couple of recent Python projects to round out the episode. The first is a library to draw stylized maps from OpenStreetMap data. The other is a framework for the analysis and visualization of trees, which includes a set of phylogenomic tools.

Course Spotlight: Using the Python return Statement Effectively

In this step-by-step course, you’ll learn how to use the Python return statement when writing functions. Additionally, you’ll cover some good programming practices related to the use of return. With this knowledge, you’ll be able to write readable, robust, and maintainable functions in Python.

Topics:

• 00:00:00 – Introduction
• 00:01:44 – Real Python Core Team Member
• 00:03:13 – How long does it take to learn Python?
• 00:03:40 – Why did you want to explore this topic?
• 00:05:05 – Python backgrounds Martin and Christopher
• 00:16:39 – What area excited you?
• 00:19:38 – Sponsor: Rev AI
• 00:20:16 – What are other areas that define, why Python?
• 00:23:30 – Keeping the scope narrower
• 00:24:48 – Measuring your progress
• 00:32:49 – Video Course Spotlight
• 00:34:12 – Effective mentorship
• 00:39:02 – Using search engines
• 00:43:07 – The journey of learning Python
• 00:48:38 – Programming challenges and practicing
• 00:49:40 – pretty maps - Minimal Python library to draw customized maps
• 00:52:02 – ETE Toolkit - Python environment for tree exploration
• 00:54:30 – Thanks and goodbye

Show Links:

• About Martin Breuss: Real Python Team
• How Long Does It Take to Learn Python?
• Four stages of competence: Wikipedia Article
• The Basic Python Syntax: Links to Real Python Resources
• BTW these large scary math symbols are just for-loops
• Measuring the “Filter Bubble”: How Google is influencing what you click
• What does Google know about me?
• Ace Your Python Coding Interview: Real Python Learning Path
• CodingBat: Coding Practice
• Episode 4: Learning Python Through Errors
• Episode 48: Stochastic Gradient Descent and Deploying Your Python Scripts on the Web

Projects:

• pretty maps: A minimal Python library to draw customized maps from OpenStreetMap data
• ETE Toolkit: A Python framework for the analysis and visualization of trees
• NCBI: National Center for Biotechnology Information
• ete-ncbiquery: Fast and handy queries to the NCBI taxonomy database

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