CIDER2022-tutorial-1

CIDER 2022: Tutorial 1: Overview and Setup

William Davis, June 20

Overview

This tutorial will be an introduction and overview of the computing tools that you will use. We will cover:

• Python
  • Using Google Colab
• MATLAB

If you have experience with computing, take this time to teach a colleague! 🙂

Python

We will be using python in Google Colab notebooks.

Requirements:

• Google account

Getting started

In the tutorial I will go over:

• Basics of notebooks
• Running pre-prepared notebooks
• Reading/saving data
• Using packages
• Getting new packages
• Q&A (throughout)

Basic features overview of Google Colab

To make a new notebook:

Google Drive -> New -> More -> Google Colaboratory

Check the version with !python --version

Loading notebooks

Download daisyworld.ipynb from the python/ directory.

Python resources

• Official documentation
• Stack Overflow
• NumPy for MATLAB users
• Python for R users
• Markdown in Google Colab
• Plotting in Google Colab
• Another python tutorial
• Python Data Science Handbook

MATLAB

We will be using MATLAB in the official IDE (interactive development environment).

Requirements:

• MATLAB with the free 30 day trial (you should have already downloaded and set up this)

Getting started

In the tutorial I will go over:

• IDE overview
• Using the command window
• Using the editor
• Navigating folders and path
• Documentation
• Scripts and functions
• Using non-library code
  • Download package from https://github.com/williamjsdavis/secn-PR
• Reading/saving data
• Q&A (throughout)

MATLAB comprehension

Try these yourself, or work with others 🙂

• Write a function and save it as a .m file
  • The function can be anything you like, e.g. sum the first 1000 primes
• Run that function in the command window
• Run that function from a .m script
• Write another function that calls the first one. Save that to a file
• Repeat 2&3 for this new function
• Write a script that calls another script
  • Why would this be useful? What benefit/difficulty does this have over a function?
• Write a function and then rename it. See what happens
• Write a function and put it at the bottom of a script. Call it at the top of the script. What happens?
  • Try writing a function in the middle of a script and see what happens
• Look into anonymous functions
  • Anonymous function documentation
  • What are the differences between these and regular functions?
  • Why might they be useful?
• Run the following code snippet
  • A = [0,0,0];B = A;B(2) = 1;A
  • Is this what you expected?
  • Try something similar in python and see what happens

MATLAB resources

• Official documentation
• Summary of basic functions
• MATLAB for python users
• MATLAB for python users cheatsheet
• MATLAB for R users

Other resources

• Scientific computing presentation
• MATLAB-Julia-Python cheatsheet