In the next few guides, we're going to talk about how you can do that on a practical basis and we're going to help set up your development environment.

Now, I'm going to present you with a number of different options because of the variety of computers you may be using-- Mac, PC, a Linux device, or maybe you don’t want to set up an environment just yet. If you’re wanting to jump straight into the code, I will demonstrate an example for each one of those scenarios, so you can pick which is best for you.

The first example is a cloud-based environment called repl.it. To go to repl.it, go to our repl.it which is also completely free to use.

You can sign up for an account and get started right away.

Click where shown below:

Here, it says “search for a language” and you can locate Python 3. I want you to sign up version 3, however, we will discuss the differences between the various Python versions. I already have an account and will not be creating a demonstration for this, but the process is fairly simple as well as free.

You will notice as we go through this course, this is the development environment I will be using—especially in the early modules. This is because I want to provide you with the fastest path to writing code, but also because repl.it gives a screencast. If you have already been through the Ruby course, you will have already seen this tool.

The main reason is, I can input code on the left and the output will be shown on the right-hand side. was because I can write code right here making everything easy to follow and organize.

To test to make sure it works, type a simple program. For example, I used print and inserted “hi there”. To run this small Python program, I can hit run or command and enter. On the right-hand side, you should see the output of “hi there”.

This is the most basic and simple way to begin writing Python code. In the next few guides, I will show you have to install the Python system and run Python scripts on your local machines.