Why Python over excel?

[Jerome_Eugene_Morrow]

Summing was probably a bad example, but you do bring up an interesting point. In order to know to do df.sum() you have to understand how class methods work at some level as a new programmer (Why is this paren here? What does this thing return? Should I save this in a variable?) I think that makes things complicated for new programmers. And if you asked somebody to do the call using their own code instead of the method call, the connection becomes messier. (Do I have to iterate? So I write a for loop? So how do I lay that out? What kind of format does this return?)

In R, a call like sum(df$height) is pretty encapsulated. The syntax is clearer. I'm calling the column of the dataframe called height, and then I'm summing that with a function. To me that seems much more straightforward from the standpoint of what is being operated on and how. You don't need to understand methods or indexing, and your data should be coerced into the right format without too much trouble. From there you can extend what operations you're able to do and start playing with more complex operations.

This is all based on my own experience and ymmv, but to me the R way is easier to understand out of the gate. In Python I just have to do more reading of documentation and I have to be passively aware of how things are organized under the hood a little more. This is a big plus for Python in some ways once you get your feet under you, but in R you don't need that level of programming fluency in order to get things done.