Why Python Should Be The First Language You Learn

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Are you looking to get into programming, but you have no clue where to start?

You've most certainly heard of the best programming languages to learn, but you're still unsure which one is the best.

Python, hands-down is the best language to start if you're looking to get into programming. There's a strong reason why 70% of introductory programming courses teach Python at Universities.

Check out our blog on The Best Way To Learn Python.

Learning programming is hard

But, Python makes it easier.

Python is easily one of the most popular and beginner-friendly languages. I've started learning Python back in 2015, and since then I've learned many other languages. I can definitely say that Python had the smallest learning curve, especially if you're new in the field of programming.

It's very usual for people who are learning programming for the first time to be disappointed and discouraged with the learning curve. Everyone experiences difficulties at the beginning.

Grasping the concept of programming and the nuances of a language is tremendously difficult on the first go.

That's why I'm suggesting that it's important to choose a language like Python that minimizes the learning curve, which avoids the frustration that might turn you away.

Let's list the reasons why I consider that why python should be the first language you should learn.

Easy readability

It's closer to natural language. This is one of the best reasons why Python should be the first language you should learn.

Python is a high-level language, which means that the code is abstracted from machine level language ( the lowest of which being 1s and 0s).

Low-level languages are the total opposite of the high-level languages.

The higher the level of the language, the easier it is for humans to read it and understand it better. It's way more difficult to understand code that only contains symbols and numbers. On the other hand, the code that looks a lot like a natural language is more easy to understand.

To be fair, would you rather start learning a language that only contains numbers and symbols, rather than one that associates you to a natural language?

python code

Whitespace rules

This rule teaches you to keep your code clean, and it turns into a habit sooner or later.

The worst thing a programmer can experience is to continue a project from a “dirty coding” programmer. You'll waste a day or a week just understanding what the code does, let alone work on it.

Python enforces rules on whitespace. To be clear, whitespace is the space in-between your lines code to be executed. Most languages allow the whitespace to exist, but Python is not one of them.

The whitespace rules that Python requires, forces the code to be correctly indented and much more organized. For beginners, understanding and practicing coding with Python is much easier when you're able to work with a structured and clean code. Keep that in mind.



Working on a team of developers

Python also helps you become better prepared to work on a team of developers.

In the long run, you'll develop a much better writing etiquette and develop a healthier habit of writing clean code. Messy code can make your life so much more difficult once you advance to harder projects.

Once you start working in teams, the cleanliness and organization of your code will be vital to maintain a functional software product. And here is why python should be the first language you should learn.

The lines of code that you're responsible for writing will be fused and integrated into thousands or millions of other lines depending on the size of the project. So, keeping it clean makes it easier for everyone, not just you.

There are a lot of good Python tutorials

Community, resources, and tutorials are all invaluable to any software. And once you get into programming, you'll realize that this is true especially for programming languages.

Since Python is dubbed as the most popular programming language, there's massive support and documentation for everything.

For a couple of years now there has been a flood of Youtubers creating content for Python. I personally spent a lot of time just watching them, and it helped a lot.

Here are my all-time 3 best Python tutorials you should start watching.

Sentdex: a very smart guy I've been watching for over a year now. Lots of interesting Python tutorials from the basic, all the way to advanced machine learning and A.I

Traversy Media: super helpful tutorials on everything you need to know about starting with Python. Also some of the best Python and Django web tutorials I've seen. Highly recommended.

Cs Dojo: easily the most popular channel for Python guides and tutorials. Ranging from 1-2 million views for his videos.

Being resourceful is the key to being a good programmer. Once you start working, you'll realize that you'll run into problems and get stuck into them. With a few research skills, you'll find the solution in no time.

And here is another reason why Python should be the first language you should learn.

 

python coding



You can do so much with Python

Python is a very versatile language and is capable of handling a lot of different jobs with good performance and efficiency. Here are the top 3 things you can do with Python.

Web development

Making websites, whether small or large, can be done through Python. Interestingly enough, huge websites like Reddit, Spotify, and Quora are developed with Python. Also, Youtube and Google are all powered by Python. Amazing, right?

Web development is done with Python's framework, Django and Flask. This helps a lot because instead of building a website from scratch, the framework offers you pieces and tools you need to put together a site.

Django is a pretty robust framework and it has been around for quite a while now. It has amazing documentation and there are countless tutorials available where you can learn from. I had a great experience with Django, and I highly recommend it.

Scientific or numeric computing

Python is incredibly useful and efficient for scientific and numeric applications. Analyzing big data for research is a very rapidly grown industry you should consider. There is so much data out there now and applications to deal with them are on high demand.

My introductory Computer Science course as Denison University was Discovering Computer Science: Scientific Data and Dynamics. We strictly used Python for everything. We analyzed and modeled data on gene sequences, used recursion with the Turtle Python graphics module to draw fractals, and even to do artwork by using algorithms to draw plants, flowers, and trees.

A really good article by activewizards.com on the Top 20 Python libraries for data science. Listed Numpy as the number one, leaving SciPy and Pandas second and third.

Machine learning

Python gained a lot of popularity for machine learning. Part of this is because Python is so efficient for numeric computing, which is the essence of machine learning.

Some of the most popular open-source Python machine learning projects are:

  • Tensorflow
  • Sci-kit-learn
  • Keras
  • PyTorch
  • Theano

You can read more about them here in this article.

The very best way to learn about Machine learning using Python is to jump into some tutorials and follow along yourself. You'll be taught how it all works, and everything you need to do to make it work.



Python developers are well paid

Financially speaking, it's a great career to follow.

Once you learn Python and get some projects,  you can become a paid developer. And as Python becomes more and more popular, companies all over the world are looking for Python developers. And, they're willing to pay a hefty sum for them too.

According to this article of ZipRecruite, the average annual pay for a Python developer is over $113k per year! Some even go as high as $170k.

Python is also the #2 most in-demand programming language as of 2019. Coding Dojo claimed that Python grew in popularity by 5,000 job openings from the previous year.

Most decent-sized software companies probably produce or use Python code somewhere in their projects.

In essence, there are no shortages of job opportunities that pay well for a Python developer.

Wrapping it up

There are a lot of reasons why Python should be the first language you should learn.

In conclusion, the learning curve is not as steep with Python.

Python is the best language to start as a beginner because of the user-friendliness it has over other languages.

Also, it enforces you to write clean and good code, because it does not allow whitespaces. This allows you also to become a team member everyone loves working with.

You can also do so much with Python: develop a website, analyze and work with big data or use it for machine learning.

Needless to say, Python is one of the most popular languages and it's a pretty safe career to follow.

And last but not least, Python developers make really good money, averaging 6-figure salaries in the US.