Should you Start Learning Python in 2018 (Guide)

Starting to learn programming most of the times is overwhelming because of the number of programming languages available to learn. This causes most of us to search for generic terms like “what is the easiest programming language to learn”.

More than 90% of the websites on the internet claims that Python is the easiest programming language to learn. This lands us to another question which is “Should I Learn Python or Not?”. In fact, not just you, I too have faced the same problem when I started to learn programming.

But, over the years of my learning, I have figured out the exact answer to this question. So, today in this post I am going to share everything you need to know in order to finally decide that do you want to add Python to your learning curriculum or NOT?

Popular Uses of Python

First of all, before deciding anything about Python, you really need to know the popular uses of Python or the areas where you can apply your Python skills into. As there is no point learning different programming languages until and unless you don’t know the proper use of those languages.

Web Development

Website.

Python has a lot of web frameworks out of which two of the most popular ones include Django and Flask. These frameworks are easy to learn and can help you write the server site code for your dynamic websites. Recently, using these Python frameworks for building websites is becoming a hot trend amongst web developers.

Using these python web frameworks for building websites are one of the top choices of many people as these frameworks come up with a lot of built in features. These features can include various security practices such as built in CSRF Token to fully secure your website.

Some of the popular websites that use Django and Flask in writing their server side code include Instagram, Pinterest, LinkedIn, The Washington Post, etc. All these sites are really big so you can imagine yourself the scalability abilities of Python powered websites.

Machine Learning

Machine Learning.

Machine learning is one of the fastest growing industries in the programming and computer science space. Machine learning is simply teaching machines how to predict different results based on the data it is already having.

Python is one of the most widely used programming languages for machine learning. It has a lot of build in libraries which makes it easier to get started with machine learning. The list of most popular libraries in Python for machine learning include scikit-learn and Tensor Flow.

But, scikit-learn is a popular choice amongst beginner’s as it is relatively easier to learn as compared to other libraries. Similarly, you can find a number of libraries in Python to get started with machine learning.

Data Analysis

Analysis.

According to MediaPost and many other sources, 90% of the available data in this world is created after 2014 and that number is rising day by day. This data is used by almost all big companies to predict various things that are useful for them. Many companies like Amazon have been admitting that Data is the future of our world.

Python makes it easier for you to analyze huge amount of data and draw useful conclusions from that data. Some of the most popular libraries in Python for Data Visualization include matplotlib. These libraries are really easy to get started with learning Data Analysis / Data Visualization.

Scripting

Scripting.

Many of you might be unaware of the term Scripting. Let me tell you, scripting is just writing some pieces of code to automate some small tasks. Like, if we want to post some message on our social media account every 10 minutes for 1 hour or you want to count the number of total emails in your inbox every hour so that you can check that if there’s a new email, then you can write some code which will automate that task for you.

One of the advantages of Python here is that it’s relatively easy to learn than other languages and makes it easier to write scripting code and get things done fast.

Desktop and Game Development

Desktop and Gaming.

Yes, you can build various desktop applications and games using Python. Python has a lot of useful libraries for doing that such as TKinter and QT for desktop applications and PyGame for game development. But, to be true Python is not the best choice for doing this as you have some popular alternatives to do that.

You can use Python to build desktop applications and games but just for personal or small purposes. If you are really serious about these things then there are other languages such as Java, C++ or C# which are relatively popular than Python in building these applications and games.

Embedded Software and Algorithms

Embedded.

Embedded software and algorithms are basically the algorithms and programs that are used inside hardware such as Raspberry Pi. These programs are suitable for you if you are a kind of hardware hobbyist and want to work with things such as Robots, different types of hardware, etc.

Python is a very popular language to do that as recently some top companies like Philips also changed their production robots code to run over Python.

Conclusion

Many people will suggest you to get started with Python as your first programming language but according to my experience it isn’t necessary at all. Actually, it depends all on your goals and what you want to do after learning programming. There is no point in learning Python as your first programming language if your goal is to develop an android application. Because in that case you have more popular and better choices such as Java, Kotlin, etc.

Everyone has specialization in different areas of computer science. So, it is necessary to first discover your interests and your goals related to programming. After discovering your interests and goals you should research a bit about the most popular programming languages used in your preferred areas and choose them accordingly.

Anyway, if you have interest in any of the areas where Python is used then you should definitely get started get started with it. As, it is easier to learn than all the other programming languages and also has a cleaner syntax, so you will be making fewer errors while learning. Once you get the concepts of Python and get familiar with it, you will find it easy to learn other languages as you will be a little bit familiar about the programming disciplines and logics.