Python: Information, Tutorials, and Workshops

Python is a simple programming language that is popular for being easy to learn to read, write, and understand. You can use Python for automating repetitive tasks like cleaning data, creating data visualizations, analyzing data, conducting complex statistical calculations, or even building machine learning algorithms. Its ease of use and versatility means that many tools have been built on top of Python, but being able to explore those requires a good foundation and understanding of the language itself first!

Getting Started

Since Python is open-source, it is completely free and doesn’t require licencing! You can download the latest version of python, or a previous version, from Python’s website.
You can also use Python through JupyterHub, an instance of Jupyter Notebooks hosted online by the University of Toronto. This means no installation is required, you’ll just need to log into JupyterHub using your UTORID. Jupyter notebooks are documents that contain both computer code (like Python) alongside explanatory text, images, figures, videos, and links. The code in a Jupyter notebook can be executed, modified, and deleted, all within the notebook. For help with JupyterHub visit UofT’s JupyterHub Support.
Python code can be run in different ways. It can be run either line by line, or in packaged scripts that contain multiple lines of code. You can read more about running Python code in various ways.

Learning resources

Workshops

At the Map and Data Library we often beginner level Python workshops. Check out our workshops page to see all our upcoming live workshops, as well as self-paced online courses or previously recorded workshops.

Embedded below are recordings of our beginner Python workshops:

An Introduction to Programming for Absolute Beginners Using Python Pt. 1

You can follow along by downloading the setup instructions(includes how to get slides, workshop files, etc.) & solutions (packaged in a zip file)

An Introduction to Programming for Absolute Beginners Using Python Pt. 2

You can follow along by downloading the setup instructions (includes how to get slides, workshop files, etc.) & solutions (packaged in a zip file)

Previous Workshops

Please note that a recording of an older version of the Part 2 workshop is also available. This version contains errors handling in the second half, and does not discuss string manipulation. Notebooks for this version are no longer supported.

A Friendly Introduction to Python for Absolute Beginners: Part 2 (2022)

Resources to Learn More

Tools: Python

Date Created: 2023-02-03 Updated: 2025-04-28