Beginners night

[richyvk]

Attended my first BrisPy tonight. It was really great. Got chatting to a couple of people after and we came up with the idea of a beginners night. Maybe something like a panel that beginners can ask questions of. Maybe some beginners like me could talk about the challenges we have found in learning. Etc. Haven't really thought about it too much. Could put some more effort into planning something if people think it's a good idea.

[SamHames]

I second this as a good idea. I can probably put a call out to find some people new to Python to talk.

[romanofski]

I like the idea too. To organise it, would you think it to be helpful to gather a few questions in this issue?

[richyvk]

Sure. I'll get some of my questions together. Can we have this after April though. I'm on hols til Easter and would hate to miss it!

[anchat1990]

Not sure how relevant this is to the beginners python issue - but as a beginner in the Beaker project, I think I'd be tempted to ask questions in relation to sqlalchemy and relational databases - as well as anything that helps me learn more about how anaconda works, and the general architecture of Linux systems.

[clintonroy]

I'm teaching some introduction to python, python&electronics classes at the edge, which feels like it should be relevant. Another issue is how to reach out to newbies, rather than relying on current members.

[SamHames]

I can probably help put the word out to find some people. Might be able to get both 'new to Python' and 'new to programming in general' perspectives depending on what people are interested in hearing about.

[danc86]

So it sounds like there is a lot of interest around this idea which is great... but I'm a little unclear on what exactly we want the format to be?

It sounds like @richyvk was suggesting a panel of expert Pythonistas who would take questions from beginners at the meeting. But to keep that interesting and relevant for the whole group we would really need to make sure we have some good questions lined up to prompt the discussion -- otherwise it would too easily get into the weeds. I guess that's what @romanofski had in mind, about preparing a list of questions in advance.

Whereas from talking to @anchat1990 it sounds like the "beginner's night" format in other meetup groups is more like a tutorial format, where beginners can attend and be given/shown some introductory material and experienced Pythonistas are available to coach them through the material. I guess that is closer to what @clintonroy is picturing too.

If we were to go with the tutorial-style format, do we have some introductory material we want to use?

[danc86]

Regardless which format we go with, it sounds like we would want plenty of time to spread the word about this event, so that we can get as many beginners attending as possible. Since the November meetup is fast approaching, I think we should leave this for the December meeting. For November we can go with #6 and #19 instead.

[richyvk]

Sorry all. I've dropped the ball on this. I still think it would be a good idea though. I guess my situation is a bit odd, in that I am not really looking to get employed to write Python (not atm anyway) which I imagine a lot of new people to the group might be. I am really a hobbyist, who uses Python at work a bit, but really only at the simple script level.

When I first suggested the idea I think I had in my head a panel that we could fire specific technical questions at, but I agree that could be a disaster.

I think my big question atm is how can someone get mentored in Python without it being employed, as a junior developer for example. I have read a fair few books, watched a lot of YouTube, interacted with people online, but something still feels like it's missing to me.

It would be great to know if there are any mentoring type programs that might exist in Brisbane, pair programming options, code review opportunities etc. Maybe people in the group are working on projects outside of their work that they might want help with and be willing to work with a beginner on a bit?

Or, maybe this is the curse of the hobbyist?

If you want to go with the tutorial option, Software Carpentry has a Python lesson (science focused) and I've been working on a Library Carpentry version (general, but a bit working with text data focused). It's still in development, but could be the basis of something? Or, maybe we could work through automatetheboringstuff?

I while back I discovered that in Melbourne there was a Code School doing intro web app workshops with Flask. Something like that would also be really cool to do up here. These might need to be done in parts though perhaps?

[ncoghlan]

Whatever we decide to do, it would probably make sense to chat to the folks behind https://www.meetup.com/en-AU/Brisbane-Tech-Newbies/ about it.

One topic I've occasionally considered proposing a talk about is "Python, search engines, and finding what you need", which would be about techniques for using search engines effectively when programming, as well as reference guides you can read to help find the words you need for more effective searches.

[anchat1990]

@ncoghlan just to give you an idea, the last tech newbies meetup had 3 parts.

• Talk 1 was to do with using linkedIn
• Talk 2 was an interactive intro to SQL (so not a workshop, but the audience was still able to engage - @danc86 i think a format like that might work for us too)
• Talk 3 was a panel discussing pros and cons of remote work...

[anchat1990]

@clintonroy would it be possible to take a look at the materials you use in your intro to python class at all?

[clintonroy]

https://github.com/clintonroy/slq2017python/

All creative commons licensed. It's taking me about two hours to go through those slides with a class of ten people. There's more to these slides than just their content of course, i try to get them working with the examples very quickly, and get them comfortable getting errors very early on.

[danc86]

Speaking to some people at tonight's meeting we came up with a bit of a plan.

As a trial run, at our next meeting in December, we can do a talk in the first half as usual. Then pizza and the second half would be a "hack night" and/or "office hours". We would line up some experienced Pythonistas who will attend as mentors or just generally available to hang out. And we would encourage people to either (a) work through Python intro course material in a group with others who are interested, and mentors helping; or (b) bring along their own code they are working on, and find others to hack on it with them, or ask questions about it of the mentors.

@ncoghlan does that sound about right?

I think the only open question is what would be the best intro course material. Ideally it would be a self-paced interactive tutorial type of thing which you can work through and get help when stuck. Someone in the room suggested Udemy but I have no idea if there are better alternatives.

[JeremyFisher]

Hey guys!

I went to the BrisPy meetup few days ago and it was a really nice experience :) Someone mentioned the "beginners night" and I would like to share some ideas since I am a beginner and am very excited to improve my python skills :)

There are 2 questions that a beginner often asks: 1) how to solve my problem? 2) how to improve the quality of my code?

I think the answer to the first question has already been introduced: beginners can ask questions to some experienced Pythonistas(?) during the "office hours".

For the second question, I think it would be great to have some general lectures on improving code quality. For instance: 1) How to use a debugger? 2) How to write tests? 3) How to monitor your scripts with Zabbix? 4) Organizing your libraries, modules, config files, etc 5) How and when should you use classes? Should you follow SOLID principles?

The goal here would be not only to learn how to debug a simple function, but to learn some good practices. When I am debugging my code, I just type "python -m pdb" and from there I use some simple options like "n", "s", "b" or setting some simple conditions but I would love to see how an expert uses the debugger.

Does it make sense? What do you think?

[FlxVctr]

@JeremyFisher I think that's a good way to think about it. On the other hand every of these points might also be interesting to intermediate, and even advanced Python users. So why don't suggest every of these topics (your 1.-5. list) as its own talk. I'm sure somebody can fill 45 minutes with every of these.

That would actually also be an idea to be more attractive for newcomers: Reserve one of the spots for a 'beginners' topic and leave the rest as it is.