The Whitman Local Edition (WLE) (Version of Summer, 2014)ΒΆ

By Albert Schueller

A word of thanks ...

We are developing a computer science program at Whitman College. As part of that development, we are switching the introductory programming language from C++ to Python.

I am a strong advocate of open source textbooks. I try to use them whenever possible. The Rhodes Local Edition (RLE) of this text seemed the closest to what I wanted to do with Python in an introductory course. However, I wanted to use an open-source integrated development environment (IDE) that was cross-platform (linux, mac, windows) whereas the RLE used a windows-only IDE. This version of the text uses the open-source, cross-platform IDE Spyder.

Many thanks to all the contributors and the prior authors for making their hard work available to the Python community and to our students.

The main differences between this, the WLE, and the prior, RLE, editions are:

  • the use of the Spyder IDE.
  • the addition of some math oriented exercises.
  • the addition of a chapter on using Python in the Processing programming environment. This alternative graphical programming environment provides easy user interfaces and quick game development.