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Python Python Collections (2016, retired 2019) Lists Shopping List Take Three

Video doesn't lead on from introduction to basics. He's doing loads of stuff we haven't covered and not explaining why.

I was enjoying the course with python basics but the tempo has changed dramtically and it's no longer easy to follow and understand. He's doing things without explaining why and what we're actually doing. I'm just copying his code knowing it wil work but not understanding why.

No longer happy with this course.

Eric M
Eric M
11,546 Points

Hi Luke,

Which concepts or blocks of code from the video would you like help with?

Cheers,

Eric

Thanks for the reply Eric it's not really a question more feedback for the video.

In the python basics there is a lot of hand holidng then suddenly we're changing our previous application using stuff like abs using index += 1, position is not None etc. Non of this was covered in python basics but it's just thrown into the previous application.

Eric M
Eric M
11,546 Points

No worries Luke,

If you do have any questions about the content that wasn't adequately covered feel free to post them.

I suspect there's some incongruity as the Python Basics course used to be different content, so it might be a bit of a rocky switchover from Craig's newer content to Kenneth's material.

abs() is one of Python's builtin functions, it returns the "absolute value" of a number. Its most common use is to force equality when working with negative numbers. For example both abs(3) and abs(-3) return 3.

+= is an operator that adds both operands together then assigns the result to the left hand side operand. For example:

my_variable = 5
my_variable += 10

At this point my_variable would contain 15.

The += operator (and the + operator) works differently depending on the types of its operands. For instance

this_string = "Team"
this_string += "Treehouse"

Would give us "TeamTreehouse". The operator is working with strings, so it performs string concatenation rather than addition.

Cheers,

Eric

1 Answer

Christopher Garrido
Christopher Garrido
525 Points

Nothing against Kenneth but honestly Craig much more clearer and better at communicating content. As soon as Kenneth comes on things get confusing.

Luke Maschoff
Luke Maschoff
820 Points

I agree some of this is confusing, but it is that we are just used to Craig, and Kenneth doesn't know everything Craig taught us.