Python — Introduction

What is Python?

Python is a programming language famous for reading almost like English. Where other languages demand ceremony, Python stays out of your way:

print("Hello, world!")

That's a complete program. Really.

Python is used for:

• Websites (Instagram and Spotify run on it)
• Data science & AI — the #1 language in that field
• Automation — renaming 5,000 files while you get coffee
• Games, robots, finance — everywhere

Why beginners love it

Compare printing numbers 1 to 3:

// JavaScript
for (let i = 1; i <= 3; i++) { console.log(i); }

# Python
for i in range(1, 4):
    print(i)

No semicolons, no curly braces — indentation itself shows structure. Your code looks like your plan.

Heads up: that also means indentation is mandatory in Python. Spaces at line-start are part of the language. We'll practice it constantly.

Getting Python

1. Download from python.org (the installer can add it to your PATH automatically)
2. Verify in a terminal: python --version
3. Write code in any editor; VS Code with the Python extension is a great free setup

Or skip installing anything: online interpreters let you run Python in the browser.

First exercise

Create hello.py containing:

name = input("What's your name? ")
print("Nice to meet you,", name)

Run it with python hello.py. You just wrote an interactive program.