Physics 212, 2019: Lecture 3

From Ilya Nemenman: Theoretical Biophysics @ Emory
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Back to Physics 212, 2019: Computational Modeling.

Most important thing to note about these lectures:

You won't learn Python by reading. You have to try coding. If you have a question how a certain expression works, type it in Python console, and test it!

Introduction to Python

  • Algorithmic thinking
    • Example: opening a door
    • Different levels of algorithms
  • Basic parts needed to design an algorithm
    • State (or memory)
    • Rules for transforming states (operations, functions, procedures)
    • Rules for making decisions
  • Assignment operation (vs. testing for equality)
    • Variable is a pointer to a container (object) in memory where a state is stored. (This is not quite correct; we will return to this later).
  • Anaconda distribution / Spyder development environment
    • How to launch it
    • Console vs. editor plus additional tools
    • Syntax highlighting / code analyzer
  • Basic syntaxes
    • Resetting the state of the system
    • Asking for help with ? and with Google
    • Built-in functions, like print
    • Numbers; note that j is the imaginary unit, not i
      • Are numbers real or integer?
    • Arithmetic operations, +, -, *, /, **.
    • Parentheses
    • Importing modules and functions from modules
      • numpy as np and matplotlib.pyplot as plt
  • Python Modules
    • Importing and reloading
    • pyplot and numpy
Exercise

We will solve a quadratic equation a*x**2+b*x+c=0 for a=1, b=2, c=-3. Do this by

  1. Resetting the environment
  2. Importing sqrt function from numpy
  3. Assigning values to a, b, c
  4. Evaluating both solutions using the standard formula you learned in middle school
  5. Printing both solutions
  • More syntaxes
    • Functions have arguments; keyword arguments
    • Functions return values
    • Functions can otherwise change Python state
Exercise

Evaluate a binary log (log base 2) of a number 42 using at least three different sets of commands. Verify your result by taking 2 to the appropriate power and seeing if you get 42 back.

  • Objects -- mutable (arrays and lists) vs. immutable (numbers)
    • Object attributes and object methods, using dir()
    • Overloading methods
  • Variables vs. objects (again!)
  • Lists vs. Numpy arrays
    • Why np.zeros((2,4)) and not np.zeros(2,4)?
    • A list of lists, and and an array of arrays
  • Creation, concatenation (stacking).
  • Slicing -- doesn't create new arrays (we will come back to this)
  • Flatten copies data, ravel and reshape does not
  • Strings
Exercise

Create a rectangular 3x4 arrays of numbers. Flatten and ravel it. Which of the commands creates new arrays and which does not? Reshape it as a 4x3 array. Did this create a new array? Check in the variable explorer. Now create a slice that corresponds to the first and the second rows (remember that row numbering starts with 0) and zeroth through second columns. Did this create a new array?

Don't forget to submit your work at the end of the class using Canvas.