• Unit 1: Introduction
• Unit 2: Expressions
• Unit 3: Data Types
• Unit 4: Conditional Logic
• Unit 5: Loops
• Unit 6: Functions
• Unit 7: Strings
• Unit 8: Defining Classes
• Unit 9: Loading and Plotting Data
• Unit 10: Tabular Data
• Unit 11: Nested Structures
• Unit 12: Simulation
• Unit 13: Recursion
• Unit 14: Bonus Topics
• Unit 15: Inheritance and Polymorphism

Unit 8: Defining Classes

Students who complete this unit will demonstrate that they can:

• Describe the motivation for object-oriented programming, particularly encapsulation
• Create new kinds of objects by defining classes
• Specify and enforce class invariants
• Use dot-notation to access class attributes
• Compare and contrast functions and methods
• Use instantiation to create instances of a class
• Use self to create attributes (variables and methods)
• Recognize and define special methods using double-underscores
• Distinguish between class and instance attributes
• Create explicit value constructors using parameters and default parameter values
• Recognize a Python method that is not intended to be used outside of a class
• Perform class customizations (e.g. __str__, __lt__, __eq__, etc.)
• Create and use operator overloading

Contents

• Forum 8
• Homework 6: Population Simulation with Classes
• Preparation 8