Lecture Notes on 27 Jan 2014

* Review number conversions
  - decimal to binary, octal, and hexadecimal and vice versa
  - binary to octal, decimal, and hexadecimal and vice versa
  - octal to hexadecimal and vice versa

* Learn the Structure of Python
  - Write the 'Hello World' program
  - Characterset - ASCII and Unicode
  - Variables
  - Types - numbers, booleans, and strings
  - Operators
    - Arithmetic: + - * / // % **
    - Comparison: < <= > >= == !=
    - Boolean: not, and, or
    - Bitwise: ~ & | ^
    - Shift: <<  >>
  - Expressions and Statements
  - Conditionals: if-else, if-elif-else
  - Loops: while, for
  - Functions:
  - Input / Output: Console and File
  - Lists
  - Tuples, Sets, and Dictionaries
  - Class
  
* Characterset is ASCII (American Standard Code for Information Interchange)
  - 7 bit binary padded with a 0 to the left to make 1 byte
  0 = 0011 0000
  A = 0100 0001
  a = 0110 0001

* Unicode is 16 bits, ASCII characters occupy the lower 8 bits.
  In Python Greek lower case alpha will be represented as '\u03B1'.

* Create meaningful short variable names. Use letters to begin your
  variable names and separate two or more words in a variable name
  by underscores.

* Implicit types in Python - numbers, booleans, and strings

* Numbers - integers and floating points numbers. Integer representation
  is exact and so is the arithmetic. Floating point representation is
  inexact and there are round off errors in computations.

* Boolean types are either True or False. 0 (zero) and '' (empty string)
  are also taken to be False. Any other number or string is taken to be
  True.

* String is either in single quotes ('') or double quotes (""). A
  character is a string of unit length.