Taking the Python Challenge

Introduction

A few months back, Icame across a cracking website called python Challenge , which poses a number of increasingly difficult challenges.

Crazy and fun at the same time

This isn’t a site for complete beginners. It assumes you already know the basics of things likeloops, branching logic, various data types, etc. It also assumes you have a specially wired brain so don’t be surprised if you run in to a few brick walls where you will probably have to cheat a little i.e. find a solution on line.

However, the best thing about this site is that each of the 33 challenges (current as of 28/10/16) covers a different skill set and gets you using different Python modules in creative ways e.g.

re for regular expressions pickle for (de)serialising Python objects zipfile for working, unsurprisingly, with zip files

I found this approach really useful in forcing me to learn new tools to solve a problem, probably one of the best ways to get familiar with tools that you may need from time to time but don’t want to just plough through some documentation when you need it.

Summary

At some point in your path to learning to code, you’ll probably find yourself stumped as to what to do next. You’ve learnt the basics, you’ve applied them to some problems you’ve had but you aren’t sure how to widen your horizons.

Try out Python Challenge and see how many challenges you can get through before your head explodes.

Till the next time.