Programming for Social Scientists
POL 42340 Programming for Social Scientists
Friday, 2-4 pm, B110 Newman Building; continuously on Matrix
You can either use an online interface at ReplIt or you can install Python on your own computer. For the latter, here are some installation instructions and the online community for the module will have a channel dedicated to installation challenges.
Overview of all the main Python code you will learn during this course: Python commands
Repository for the main project: ucd-prog-2025 on Github
| 1 | 24/1 | Introduction: Programming and simulations | slides | lab | Videos: what is programming? | using git Software (optional): Python | Visual Studio Code | git |
| 2 | 31/1 | Variables and functions | slides | lab | Videos: variables and functions | random numbers |
| 3 | 7/2 | Conditions and flow | slides | lab | Videos: conditional expressions |
| 4 | 14/2 | Loops and lists | slides | lab | Videos: lists | dictionaries | loops |
| 5 | 21/2 | Working with text | slides | lab | Videos: strings and user input External links: string functions | formatters |
| 6 | 28/2 | Types, classes, and object-oriented programming | slides | lab | Videos: object-oriented programming |
| 7 | 7/3 | (continued) | slides | lab | |
| 8 | 28/3 | Reading and writing text files | slides | lab | Videos: working with files |
| 9 | 4/4 | Databases and data files | slides | lab | |
| 10 | 11/4 | Testing, debugging, and exception handling | slides | lab | Videos: exceptions |
| 11 | 25/4 | Class inheritance | slides | lab |