Introduction to Computation and Programming Using Python: With Application to Understanding Data (The MIT Press) by John V. Guttag (PDF)

Description

The new edition of an introductory text that teaches students the art of computational problem solving, covering topics ranging from simple algorithms to information visualization.This book introduces students with little or no prior programming experience to the art of computational problem solving using Python and various Python libraries, including PyLab. It provides students with skills that will enable them to make productive use of computational techniques, including some of the tools and techniques of data science for using computation to model and interpret data. The book is based on an MIT course (which became the most popular course offered through MIT’s OpenCourseWare) and was developed for use not only in a conventional classroom but in in a massive open online course (MOOC). This new edition has been updated for Python 3, reorganized to make it easier to use for courses that cover only a subset of the material, and offers additional material including five new chapters.Students are introduced to Python and the basics of programming in the context of such computational concepts and techniques as exhaustive enumeration, bisection search, and efficient approximation algorithms. Although it covers such traditional topics as computational complexity and simple algorithms, the book focuses on a wide range of topics not found in most introductory texts, including information visualization, simulations to model randomness, computational techniques to understand data, and statistical techniques that inform (and misinform) as well as two related but relatively advanced topics: optimization problems and dynamic programming. This edition offers expanded material on statistics and machine learning and new chapters on Frequentist and Bayesian statistics.

User’s Reviews

Editorial Reviews: Review John Guttag is an extraordinary teacher and an extraordinary writer. This is not ‘a Python book,’ although you will learn Python. Nor is it a ‘programming book,’ although you will learn to program. It is a rigorous but eminently readable introduction to computational problem solving, and now also to data science―this second edition has been expanded and reorganized to reflect Python’s role as the language of data science.―Ed Lazowska, Bill & Melinda Gates Chair in Computer Science & Engineering, and Director of the eScience Institute, University of Washington About the Author John V. Guttag is the Dugald C. Jackson Professor of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering at MIT.

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐I thought that it was a decent guide with OCW’s 6.0001, although I do wish the explanations were a bit more detailed. I thought that the book gave solid explanations of fundamental conceptions.

⭐It ages wellThere are some really eloquent things you can do in Python, since dict and json are so interrelated.This work really starts of in a relevant way, with techniques that are easy to remember and some advanced chapters that even seasoned data scientists could use.What I find most refreshing is that the topics are not copy-pasta to include any beginner topics or waste any time on explaining high-school level CS curricula. The topics are more about performant ways to deal with data and common challenges that arise when working with other SDK’s and external data, such as when you have a work project and need to interact with other language-agnostic processes with industry-standard techniques and responses.I personally use Flask, Bottle, and as much as the language-provided packages as possible when creating new software.

⭐Without a doubt, this book is a masterpiece on computation and computer science.I bought this book for the Edx lesson Introduction to Computer Science and Programming Using Python.After finished 2 chapters, it’s quite obvious that Prof. Guttag is an expert in his fields.I like the clear and light language of this book.As the author said, this book will be many students only formal exposure to computer science.I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to become more confident in programming and more skillful in problem-solving using computers.I encourage you to enroll in the Edx lesson I mentioned.The second edition has been greatly expanded compared to the first edition.It contain two-semester-long material now.I’m a Chinese and I choose the slowest shipping option.The shipping process took 45 days.I think that I’ll never buy any book from Amazon.com.I think Amazon Japan will be a better choice. companion

⭐Delivered on time and in good shape. I ended up returning It because I decided not to take the class for which this book was recommended.

⭐This is a great book that covers a lot of ground on the field of computer science. Don’t expect it to be a step by step guide of how to program in the Python language, or how to use its multiple libraries. Instead this books uses Python to teach you about computation and how to think and solve problems like a computer scientist.Sintaxis, semantics, algorithms and computational complexity are some of the topics you can expect to see in this book, and even though, at some point I had to spent quite a bit of time rereading to grasp some of the concepts, if you have the patience and time, is well worth it!Finger exercises (coding exercises) really give you a chance to put the knowledge you acquire to good use

⭐This book is well written for people wanting to jump right into coding. There are no long stories about computer and programming history. It gets you right into it. The syntax descriptions make the language straightforward to learn. A right buy for beginners and those needing a refresher!

⭐I chose this book for teaching a small intro CS class in Python (3), after reviewing a lot of other books. So many are focused on all the details of the language, but I wanted a book that taught more of the big ideas of computer science/programming. Like: exhaustive enumeration is an amazingly powerful tool in 2016 where our processors go way faster than our programmers go. And bisection search. There’s other good, practical outlook in the book. Go read the table of contents. I wish the introduction of OOP were a little easier for beginners. I enjoy Guttag’s footnotes and musings.

⭐For the Beginner programer was a little different to understand but otherwise met the needs for a course I was developing. The university chose to go with another book. Terrell

⭐A recommended text for the MIT, EdX MOOC on Computing with Python is “Introduction to Computation and Programming using Python”. On searching for that, I came across this update, which includes “…with application to understanding Data”. MOOCs come in all shapes and sizes, and at first glance you might think that this book, like it’s MOOC, will enable you with Python programming prowess. It may do, but, it being an MIT production, you really need to read the title carefully to appreciate what it’s all about… which is computational thinking: it’s not just an ABC of Python. The book could just as well be written “using” any programming language – assuming Turing Completeness of course (an early example of a computational tenet introduced but not laboured upon).The thrust of the book, therefore, is to begin to fill your empty mental toolbox with the kind of conceptual computational hardware you would need to take on any programming task. You could exhaustively iterate (again, described in the book) over the hundreds of Python manuals, however, if you were to recurse over them, this book should be set as your base case (see what I’m doing here!).In all seriousness, this is one of the best “introduction” type books I’ve read and I think that’s because its emphasis is on providing the reader with a computational foundation. Sure, you will learn Python and how to implement it in the process, but it’s the concepts that are the really useful knowledge. To both ends of concept and implementation, this book is rich in content, well presented and well illuminated by numerous examples. The author is very much on the student’s side, though he does assume the reader will have enough gumption to at least practice implementing the concepts, and maybe even dig a little deeper.It’s a very good and accessible first step into computational concepts, it’s an even better book if you particularly want to learn how to implement such in Python, and it should be a foundation introduction text for anyone wanting to use Python to pursue an interest in Data Science.

⭐same as mit 6001 – excellent

⭐This book helped me grow as a python programmer. I knew the very basic of programming(High school c++). This book easily explains the core concepts of programming and computation along with introduction to Python language. I strongly recommend this book along with edx course by Prof. John Guttag and Prof. Eric Grimsson for aspiring new Python programmers. The assignments and projects were really interesting and helped me alot understand the core concepts about the language and computer science. The course was so interesting that ,I bought a verified certificate for the online course.It has one or two practice question per concept as finger exercises,the online course gives a lot more content and projects.

⭐Great book for learning Python from scratch

⭐Very good book, very good companion for the MOOC it was written for. Unfortunately not too many practice questions for my liking

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