Chapter 03: Lecture Notes

With "Batteries Included" one big theme is that there are lots and lots of things already shipped with Python. I don't feel like you need to memorize all those, just keep in mind that they are there and that you can navigate documentation if needed.

Instead, lecture will focus on some major issues that I know are likely to be confusing at first:

• Difference between stand-alone function calls, such a sqrt(2), versus object-oriented function calls, such as spot.fetch(slippers).
• Distinction between a class (e.g. str) and an object that is an instance of the class (e.g. 'hello')
• Individual objects each have their own state (but the class of objects rely on common implementation of their member functions)
• Some common synonyms we might use for terminology