PYTHON FUNDAMENTALS

PROGRAM : It is a set of instructions that govern the processing.

Example : Write a program in python to add two numbers.

def sum_two_numbers(a,b):
c=a+b
return c
d = sum_two_numbers(5,6)
print(“sum of given two number is ”,d)

PYTHON BASICS : Character set, Tokens, Expressions, Statements, Simple input and output etc.
PYTHON CHARACTER SET : It is a set of valid characters that a language can recognize. Python
supports Unicode encoding standard.
 Letters : A-Z, a-z
 Digits : 0-9
 Special Symbols : space, +, -, *, /, **, \, (), [], {}, = , !=, ==, <, > , ‘ ,“, “, ‘, ; , : , %
 Whitespaces : Blank space, Tabs, Carriage return, Newline.
 Other Characters : Python can process all ASCII and Unicode characters as part of data.
TOKENS / LEXICAL UNITS / LEXICAL ELEMENTS : The smallest individual unit in a program is
known as a token.
Python has following tokens :
a) Keyword : It is a word having special meaning reserved by programming language. They
cannot be used for normal identifier names.
b) Identifiers (Names) : It is defined as names given to different parts of the program (
variables, objects, classes, functions, list, dictionaries etc)
Rules :
 First character must be a letter or _ .
 Upper case and lower case letters are different.
 Digits 0-9 can be a part of the identifier except for the first character.
 An identifier must not be a keyword of python.
 An identifier cannot contain any special character except __ .
Valid Identifiers : Myfile, Date9_7, _sci.
Invalid Identifiers : Data – Record, 29Science, break, my.file.

c) Literals / Values : They are fixed values or constant values. Python supports several kinds
of literals.
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  String Literal : It is defined as a sequence of characters surrounded by quotes ( single
or double or triple quotes).
Example : ‘Vishu’, “Priyanshu”,’’’Jiya’’’etc.
 Python allows certain nongraphic characters in string values.
 Nongraphic characters are those characters that cannot be typed directly
from keyboard such as backspace, tabs, carriage return.
 Nongraphic characters can be represented by using escape sequences, which
are represented by a backslash ( \ ) followed by one or more characters.
Example : print(‘ \\ ’)
String Types in Python : Python supports two types of strings :
1. Single Line Strings (Basic Strings): It must terminate in one line.
Example : a = ‘ hello
there ‘
Error : By default, python creates single line strings with both single or double quotes. So,
if at the end of a line, there is no closing quotation mark for an opened quotation mark,
python shows an error.

2. Multi Line Strings : It can be created in two ways :

 By adding a backslash at the end of normal single – quote / double – quote strings.
 By typing the text in triple quotation mark (both triple apostrophe or triple quotation
marks will work)
Size of Strings : It is defined as number of characters in a string.
Example :
‘abc’ : 3, ‘hello’ : 5 , “\ab” : 2 , ‘Sajal’s pen’ : Syntax error, ‘Seema\’s pen’ : 11, “Amy’s” : 4,
‘Amy”s’ : 4
For multi – line strings created with triple quotes, the EOL (end of line) is also counted while
calculating the size of the string.
For multi – line strings created with single / double quotes and backslash character at the EOL,
the backslashes are not counted in the size of the string.

 Numeric Literal : Types of Numerical literals :-

 int (signed integers) : Positive or negative whole numbers with no decimal point.
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  float : It represent real numbers and are written with a decimal point.
 Complex : Complex numbers of form “a + bJ”, where J2 = -1. (a = real part, b = imaginary
part of the complex number)
INTEGER LITERALS : Python allows three types of literals
 Decimal Integer Literal (0 to 9): It does not start with 0 (zero). Example : 1234, 41 , -98
 Octal Integer Literal (0 to 7): Starts with 0o. Example : 0o28, 0o14.
 Hexadecimal Integer Literal (0 to 9 AND A to F) : Starts with 0X. Ex : 0XACD (Valid),
0XPQR(Invalid).
FLOATING POINT LITERALS / REAL LITERALS : They have fractional part. They can be written in
two forms :
 Fractional form : 2.0 , 17.5, -13.0, .5 (will represent 0.5)
 Exponent form : It consist of two parts
Example : 5.8 can also be written as 0.58 x 101
 Mantissa : 0.58
 Exponent : 101
 Boolean Literal : TRUE(non – zero value) and FALSE(0).
 Special Literal None: It is used to indicate the absence of value.
d) Operators : Operators are tokens that trigger some computations when applied to
variables and other objects in an expression.
Types of operator:
1. Unary operator : +, - , ~(bitwise complement), not (logical negation)
2. Binary operator : +,-,*,/ (floating point divison) ,%,** (exponent),// (integer division)
3. Relational operator : <,>,<=,>=,==,!=
4. Logical operator : AND,OR
5. Assignment operator : =,/=,+=,-=,*=,%=,**=,//=
6. Membership operator : in, not in
7. Bitwise operator : & (bitwise AND) , ^ (XOR) , | (bitwise OR)
8. Shift operator : << (shift left), >>(shift right)
9. Identity operator : is , is not

e) Punctuators : Punctuators are special symbols that are used in programming languages to
organize programming – sentence structure, and indicate the rhythm and emphasis of
expressions, statements and program structure.
Example : ‘ , “ , # , ( ), = etc.

EXPRESSIONS : Any legal combination of symbols that represent a value is called an expression.
Example : 15, 56, a+5, (3+5)/ 4

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STATEMENT : It is a programming instruction that does something i.e some action takes place.
Example : print(5+3) , where ‘print(5+3)’ is a statement and ‘(5+3)’ is an expression
b = a - 5 , where ‘b = a - 5’ is a statement and ‘a-5’ is an expression.
COMMENT : Comments are the additional readable information to clarify the source code. It
begins with symbol #.
Types of comment are as follows :
 Full line comment :
# Main program code follows now
 Inline comment :
if b < 5 : # checking if b is less than 5
 Multi-line comment / Block comment : We can enter multi – line comment in python code
in two ways :
 Add a # symbol in the beginning of every physical line.
Example :
#Multiline comments are useful for detailed additional information.
#Related to the program in question.
 Type a comment as a triple – quoted multi-line string
Example:
‘’’ Multiline comments are useful for detailed additional information.Related to the
program in question. ‘’’
Docstring : Comments enclosed in triple quotes (“””) or triple apostrophe (‘’’) are
called docstrings. They are very useful for documentation.

FUNCTIONS : It is a block of code that has a name and it can be reused by specifying its name in
the program, where needed.

BLOCK / CODE BLOCK / SUITE AND INDENTATION : A group of statements which are part of a
function are called block.
VARIABLES : It is a named location that refers to a value and whose values can be used and
processed during the program run.
>>> a = 5 >>> student = ‘Jacob’ >>> age = 15
LVALUE AND RVALUE
lvalue : Expressions that can come on the LHS of an assignment or lvalues are the objects to
which we can assign a value or expressions
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rvalue : Expressions that can come on the RHS of an assignment or rvalues are the literals and
expressions that are assigned to lvalues.
Example : a = 10 , where a is lvalue and 10 is rvalue.
MULTIPLE ASSIGNMENTS
 Assigning same value to multiple variables >>> a = b = c = 10
 Assigning multiple values to multiple variables >>> x, y, z = 10, 20,30
 Swapping two variables >>> x, y = y, x

Note : Expressions separated with commas are evaluated from left to right and assigned in same order.
Example 1: Example 2: Example 3:
a , b, c = 5, 10, 7 x = 10 x , x = 20,30
b, c, a = a+1, b+2, c-1 y, y = x+2, x+5 y, y = x+10, x+20
print(a,b,c) 6,6,12 print(y) 15 print(x,y) 30 50

In Python, a variable is created when a value is assigned to it.

Example :
print(x) NameError : ‘x’ is not defined
x = 20
print(x) 20

DYNAMIC TYPING : In dynamic typing, a variable pointing to a value of a certain type, can be made to
point to a value/object of different type.
Example :
x=10
print(x) 10
x= “Hello world”
print(x) Hello world
CAUTION WITH DYNAMIC TYPING
X=10
Y=0
Y=X/2
X=’day’
Y=X/2 Error!! A string cannot be divided
TYPE (variable_name)
>>> a =10 >>>a =10.5 >>>a =”hello”
>>> type(a) >>> type(a) >>> type(a)
<class ‘int’> <class ‘float’> <class ‘str’>

SIMPLE INPUT : Built-in function input( ) is used to take input from the user.
Example :
name = input (‘What is your name ?’)
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Note : input () always returns a value of string type.
Age = input(“Enter your age : ”)
Age = Age + 1 Error : string cannot be added with an integer

Solution:
Age =(int(input(“Enter your age : ”)))
Age = Age + 1

SIMPLE OUTPUT THROUGH PRINT STATEMENT : Built – in print( ) function.