1 Motivation & Perspective

You may have asked yourself

Why should I learn Python if I already know Java?

or

Why should I learn Python if I already know C++?

My elevator pitch would include discussions of prototyping, data science, machine learning, web programming, and automation. Yes… that is dangerously close to buzzword soup.

2 Readability

Python is a general purpose programming language (just like C++ and Java). However, Python often reads like pseudocode or, sometimes, plain English.

Take a moment to consider the following code snippet…

print(sum(range(1, 101)))

In the code we… print the sum of the range of numbers from 1 up to (but not including) 101.

Of course… that is a bit of a forced example… and borderline disingenuous. A simple one-line program is not representative of Python as a whole. However, Python tends to be an order of magnitude more readable than C++ and Java.

3 Prototyping

Python can be used to prototype software, including

4 The Real Reason

No matter how much anyone tries to describe the benefits of Python, the flexibility of Python, or the number or libraries available in Python (via pip)… the real reason to learn Python is accessibility.