Physics89L

Welcome to the repository for the class modules for Physics 89L: Introduction to Data Analysis, With Python and Jupyter.

Each week you will be working through 1-3 notebooks during the lab time, and then spending some additional time writing up a short report on what you did.

This github repository contains the notebooks that you will be using, as well as the data and figures that you will need to run those notebooks.

For up-to-date information, please go to the website

Running these notebooks on your computer

Installing Python / Jupyter on your computer

Jupyter is an interactive environment that we will be using to run the notebooks for this course. The best/ most flexible way to run jupyter is to install it on your computer. The easiest way to do that is to install it as part of an installation of the "Anaconda" data analysis enviroment.

You can download anaconda for free here:

https://www.anaconda.com/products/individual

https://jupyter-notebook-beginner-guide.readthedocs.io/en/latest/index.html

Installing and updating this Repository on your computer

Option 1: by downloading (easy, but you will have to manually update each week)

Click on the green "Code" button above and select "Download ZIP" from the drop-down menu.

Note that this will download the current version of the repository, so you will want to do this each week before class. You probably want to save the older version first so that you can refer to previous work.

Option 2: using github desktop app (a bit longer to setup, but easy to update each week)

1. Install the github desktop app from here: https://desktop.github.com/
2. Once you have installed it, click on the "Current Repository" box in the upper left corner. This gives you a text box and a pull-down menu.
3. Type in 'KIPAC/Physics89L' into the test box and select "Clone Repository..." from the pull down menu
4. This will "clone" the repository onto your computer, for example putting it in "Documents/GitHub/Physics89L"
5. At any point you can then update your local copy from the "origin" repository by clicking on "Fetch Origin" button.
6. This will show all the changes that you have made to your local version. Git allows you do to many things, such as saving your local version and keeping track of the differences, but the simplest thing to do is either rename the files that you have changed or just to right-click on the little box next to the each file and select "Discard Changes"

Options 3: using conda and git from a terminal to set up your work enviroment

If you know how to do this, or have a friend who knows how to do this, then please go ahead. If you are interested to learn, we can arrange a tutorial during one of the office hours or point you at some instructions if you are feeling adventurous.

Backup plan, Running these notebooks using jupyter on the web.

You can also use the service "binder" to run the notebooks on a remote server on the web. This works, but has the disadvantage that it can be difficult to the work you do in the notebook, so you will probably end up copying things to

1. Go to https://mybinder.org/
2. Type "KIPAC/Physics89L" into the "GitHub repository name or URL" text box and then click on the orange "Launch" button, it will take a few minutes to set up a machine somewhere off in the cloud and connect you to it.

Opening a Notebook in your browser

One you have started jupyter, it will pop up a browser window showing the contents of what jupyter treats as your home folder.