Details: Written by: Jeremie Bellanger; Category: Python for Noobs; Last Updated: 12 February 2025

Chapter 2: Discovering Python

This course is intended to introduce computer programming, with Python, to an audience of complete beginners. It is thus included in the SNT courses that I teach in high school , but can also be aimed at anyone, wishing to discover the mysteries of programming! 😎

What is Python?

In 2025, Python is a popular programming language, invented in the 1990s by Guido Van Rossum.

It is widely used for coding web applications, softwares, but also data analysis algorithms.

It was chosen to introduce high school students to computer programming because it's accessible and relatively simple to learn and understand for beginners. 🥳

It is based on explicit logic and a refined syntax, which are similar to those of the spoken language.

To complete this course, you can refer to the official Python documentation, by following this link. 🤖

My first Python program

To see how simple Python is, we will start right away with a first program! 😀

Create a new Python file in your favorite IDE (e.g. Edupython or VS Code) or online like here, and type the following code:

print("Hello World!")

Then click on the arrow or Run the code to launch the program. Hello World! will then appear in the Terminal or console, as in VS Code below:

But why is it written Hello World? 😨

Because it's a tradition, when you discover a new programming language, to start with something simple, like displaying Hello World! to test if it works correctly. 🤓

Exercise 1

Now, your first exercise will be to replace "Hello World!" with whatever you want to test. Go ahead, have fun!
But don't forget to indicate what you want to write between the quotation marks "", otherwise, it won't work! We'll see why, later. 😉

That’s it for this first chapter of discovering Python!

See you soon! ☺️