python newbie

[Steven D'Aprano]

On Wed, 18 Jun 2014 05:10:03 -0700, Maura E Monville wrote:

> My supervisor has palmed me off with a python code, written by a
> collaborator, which implements an algorithm aimed at denoising the dose
> distribution (energy per unit mass) output from a radiation transport
> Monte Carlo code. My task is to translate the python code into a MatLab
> code. A colleague of mine and I stared at the python code for a while
> without understanding the logic. To me that code looks like Chinese or
> Arabian. I don't have clear ideas about the syntax and python variables.
> For instance, in MatLab there is the cell array storage type to host
> data of different type. I have no idea how a 3D matrix can be loaded
> through python. Does a debugger exist for python code ? Is there an easy
> concise user's manual ?


If you don't understand how to even read Python code, using a debugger 
isn't going to help you.

Start by spending an hour or two to go through the tutorial, to get up to 
speed with the basic principles of the syntax:

https://docs.python.org/2/tutorial/

If you're using Python 3, you should use this instead:

https://docs.python.org/3/tutorial/


Although there aren't very many differences between the versions, when 
you're learning something for the first time, those differences can be 
perplexing.

Once you've done that, you'll be better able to ask sensible questions 
about your code. Feel free to show us your code (especially snippets) if 
there is anything unclear.



-- 
Steven