Fundamentals of Computer

Science and Programming

Unit 4 – Programming Part I

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 Outline

1. Programming tools
2. Requirements
3. Variables
4. Integers and Floats
5. Strings
6. Casting, Printing, Commenting, None-Keyword
7. Boolean variables and operators
8. Conditions (if-Statements)
9. Exercise

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Programming tools

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 How does “text” become an executable program?

 When translating source code (“text”)

 The computer translates your written code into machine language.
 There are two different ways of translation:
 Compiler
 One-time translation into a binary file (executable)
 Interpreter
 Interpretation of the source code at each execution

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 Compiler

 Translates source code into machine code

 The resulting executable (file) only contains computer instructions
 The executable is no more human readable
 Saved as binary file (executable)
 Translation takes place only once!
 This process is also called compilation
000100111
print(”Hi”) compile
 The computer
… directly executes the program (executable)
101101100
110111010

Source code Executable file

(.exe)

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 Interpreter
 Similar to the compiler
 The program gets executed using computer instructions, but:
 Each command (e.g. print(“Hi”)) gets translated on its execution
 No additional binary file (executable) is created
 Source code gets translated on each execution
 This process is called “interpretation”
 Compilers can lead to drastic performance advantages

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 Basic terms in programming languages

 Programming language
 Formal language with fixed rules
 Syntax
 Fix rules on how to write in a programming language
 Fix rules for all language elements
 Semantics
 Meaning of the language elements
 What is exectued?
 Program logic, program flow, program structure
 Execution sequence and interplay between different program parts

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Requirements

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 Requirements

 Computer (Mac OSX, Linux, Windows)

 No tablet
 No smartphone
 Python3 interpreter
 Integrated Development Environment (IDE)
 Jupyter Notebook / Jupyter Lab
 Installation instruction: https://github.com/dhelic/focsp/blob/main/installation.md

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Python (www.python.org)

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Jupyter (www.jupyter.org)

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 Python3

 Python 3.10 is recommended for the exercise

 Good readability, clear structure
 Interpreted
 Runs on all common OS

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Variables

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 Variables

 Labels (names) for values and computations

 Variables reference values
 Placeholders
 Assignment of values with =
 <Variable name> = <Assigned value>
 Transient (temporary) storage of values
 Lifetime ends with the end of the program execution
 Start value is needed, after that we can change to arbitrary values
 Mutable

number = 123
message = 'Hello World!'
number2 = number

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 Variables

 Naming conventions for variable names

 Fixed rules (if not followed results in errors)
 Only letters, numbers and underscore _
 No numbers at the beginning
 No whitespaces
 Style guidelines
 Lower case, short and descriptive
 Words separated with underscore _
 https://github.com/dhelic/focsp/blob/main/style.md
 Notebook examples

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 Variables and data types
Data type Function Examples
int Natural numbers x = 3
float Floating point numbers x = 3.0
bool Booleans x = True
x = False
str Strings x = 'Test'
x = "Test"
tuple Tuples x = (1, 2, 3)
list Lists x = [1, 2, 3]
dict Dictionaries x = {1: 'blue', 2:
'red'}
io.TextIOWrappe Files x = open('readme.txt')
r
... ... ...

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Integers and Floats

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 Integers and floating point numbers

 Integers:
 1, -13, 15, -42, 12345, ...
 Floats:
 1.3, 3.14159, -42.123, …

 Arithemtic operations:
 Adding (+), Subtracting (-), Multiplying (*), Dividing (/)
 Exponantiating (**)
 Modulo Operator (%)

number = 5 + 13
number_2 = number + 5

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 Extended operators

 Arithemtic operations with direct assignement:

 Adding (+=), Subtracting (-=), Multiplying (*=), Dividing (/=)

number = 42 number = 42
number += 8 # => 50 number = number + 8
number -= 10 # => 40 number = number - 10
number /= 4 # => 10 number = number / 4
number *= 2 # => 20 number = number * 2

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 Some special cases

 Operations with integers and Float == Float

 4/2 = 2.0, 2 * 3.0 = 6.0, 3.0 ** 2 = 9.0
 Floating point error
 0.2 + 0.1 ≠ 0.3
 Notebook examples

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Strings

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 Strings

 Text = sequence of characters

 Begin and end marked with quotation marks " or '

string = 'This is a string'

string = "This is also a string"
string = '"Python" was named after "Monty
Python".'
string = '''This is a multiline
string'''
string = """This is another multiline
string"""

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 Strings

 Accessing
 Individual characters: [] and an index (0-based!)
 First character = index 0
 Last character = length of the string – 1
 Multiple characters with slicing: [], : and indices
 Length: len(string)

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 String slicing

 Slicing
 Retreive the i-th character:
 string[i]
 Retrieve a substring with characters from start (inxlusive) until end (exclusive):
 string[start:end]
 Retrieve a substring with characters from start (inxlusive) until end (exclusive)
in steps of the given size:
 string[start:end:stepsize]

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 String slicing

 Advanced slicing
 Retreive the i-th last character:
 string[-i]
 Retrieve everything from the i-th last character (inclusive):
 string[-i:]
 Retrieve everything until the i-th last character (exclusive):
 string[:-i]
 Reversed string:
 string[::-1]

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 String slicing: example

text = 'Vienna'

Command with text Result

text[0] 'V'
text[:2] 'Vi'
text[0:2]
text[6] IndexError
text[5] 'a'
text[-1]
text[2:] 'enna'
text[2:6]
text[::2] 'Ven'

text[::-1] 'anneiV'

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 String methods

 Strings are flexible with a Call Result

huge standard functionality name + ' , hi!' 'John Doe, hi!'
 Methods take actions on text * 2 ' Python! Python! '
the variable values
name.title() 'John Doe'
 Examples:
name.upper() 'JOHN DOE'
text = ' Python! ' text.lower() ' python! '
name = 'John Doe'
text.rstrip() ' Python!'
text.lstrip() 'Python! '
text.strip() 'Python!'
name.split(' ') ['John', 'Doe']

 Notebook examples

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Casting, Printing, Commenting,
None-Keyword

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 Conversion between data types
num1 = 123
 Casting: converting between data types num2 = '15'
num3 = num1 + num2
 int(), str(), float(),
bool()… Output:
 Examples: TypeError
 int('5') 1 num1 = 123
=> 5
2 num2 = '15'
 float('5.23') => 5.23 --> 3 num3 = num1 + num2
 str(5) => '5' TypeError: unsupported
 int(True) => 1 operand type(s) for +:
'int' and 'str'
 bool(0) =>
False Solution:
num1 = 123
num2 = '15'
num3 = num1 + int(num2)

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 Formatting output

 print() function
 Prints also a new line at the end
 Parameters separated with ,
 Space character as a whitespace
 We can also print and format variables
 f before the string to print
 Variables in brackets {}

name = 'Max'
age = 20
print(f'My name is {name} and I am {age} years old')

Output: My name is Max and I am 20 years old

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 Formatting output

 Whitespaces and special characters

Sequence Result
\n New line
\t Tabulator
\' ' character in strings
\" " character in strings
\\ \ character (backslash)

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 Comments

 Syntax
 # single-line comment
 """ multi line
comment """
 ''' multi line
documentation '''
 Explanations to program flow and structure
 Supports understanding of the program
 Useful for group projects, longer lasting projects, etc.

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 None-Keyword

 None
 No value, Null value
 Placeholder when the variable value is still not assigned
 x = None is different than:
0
 False
 ''
 Notebook examples

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Boolean variables and operators

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 Boolean variables

 Boolean variables (boolean, bool) store true/false values

 True
 False
 Boolean variables are results of comparisons of other variables

value = ((2 + 2) < 4)

print('This is', value)

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 Comparison operators

Operator Description Example

== is equal x == y
!= is not equal x != y
> greater than x>y
< smaller than x<y
>= greater or equal x >= y
<= smaller or equals x <= y
is objects are identical x is y
is not objects are different x is not y

Result of comparisons: Boolean value (True oder False)

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 Logical operators

Operator Description Example

and True iff both statements are true x == y and y < 5
or False iff both statement are false x > 2 or y > 3
not Negation of the statement not x == y
not z
^ True iff one of the statements is true (XOR) x == 2 ^ y < 4

 Note that ^ is so-called bitwise operator

 Works on bits
 Result of each comparison is a boolean value
 Hence, this should work as expected

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 Operator precedence
Operator precedence  If not sure: ()
(from low to high)
 Notebook examples
or
and
not
in, not in, is, is not, <, <=, >, >=, !=, ==
|
^
&
<<, >>
+, -
*, @, /, //, %
+x, -x, ~x
**

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Conditions (if-Statements)

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 Branching: if statements

 Checking whether conditions are satisfied

 Conditional execution of code
 Control flow
 If condition satisfied then do something
 Syntax:

if condition: if x > 2:
print('Do something') print('In if')
print('Not in if')

Indented 4 spaces

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 Branching: if-else statements

 If statement with a fallback

 In case the condition is not fullfilled
 If condition satisfied then do something else do something else
 Syntax:

if condition:
print('Do something')
else:
print('Do something else')

if x > 2:
print('In if')
else:
print('In else')

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 Branching: if-elif-else statements

 Multiple branching for more complex case

 If first condition satisfied then do something
else if second condition then do something else
else if third condition then do somenthing else than before
…
else do something completly different

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 Branching: if-elif-else statements

 Syntax:

if condition:
print('Do something')
elif condition2:
print('Do something else')
elif condition3:
print('Do something different')
# there could be more elifs below this
else: # optional
print('Do something completely different')

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 Branching: if-elif-else statements

 Examples:

if x < 5: if x < 5:
print('Small') print('Small')
elif x < 15: if x < 15:
print('Medium') print('Medium')
elif x < 20:
print('Big') ≠ if x < 20:
print('Big')
else: else:
print('Huge') print('Huge')

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 Indentation rules

 Standard PEP8 (https://peps.python.org/pep-0008/)

 4 spaces, no tabulators (configure editors to replaces tabs with 4 spaces)
 Block indentation
 Everything that is indented after : belongs to the current block
 This is language syntax!
 Not following the syntax results in an error
 Implicitly: supports formatting and readability of code
 Changes the relation to the rest of the code
 if, for, while, def, …

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 Nested indentation
 Code blocks can be arbitrarly nested at multiple levels

age_max = 35
age_peter = 42
age_berta = 37

if age_max < age_peter:

print('Max is younger than Peter')
if age_berta < age_max:
print('Berta is the youngest!')
else:
print('Max is the youngest!')
else:
if age_berta < age_peter:
print('Berta is the youngest!')
else:
print('Peter is the youngest!')

 Notebook examples

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Exercise

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 Student task

Task 1: Install python3 and jupyter lab. You can follow these installation instructions.
After installation is complete start the jupyter lab and implement following tasks in
separate cells:
1. Initialize variables radius and side with positive values. Compute the area of a
circle with a given radius and the area of a square with a given side. Compute the
difference of the larger area to the smaller area of the two.
2. Initialize an integer variable x. Write a code to decide wheather x is divisible by
both 2 and 3, by either only 2 or 3, or by neither 2 nor 3.
3. The volume of a sphere with radius r is . Write a cell to compute the volume of a
sphere. What is the volume of a sphere with radius 5?
4. Suppose the cover price of a book is €24.95, but bookstores get a 40% discount.
Shipping costs €3 for the first copy and €0.75 for each additional copy. What is the
total wholesale cost for 60 copies? Write a cell to compute this cost.

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