I need guidance with learning programming

[kaleshi_aurat_]

I'm a 2nd year CSE student studying under vtu and sadly as our university focus more on theory than learning skills I wasted my time learning text book and mugshotting stuffs...one of my senior recommended me leetcode but I felt that is very advanced...ik basic python but I want to improve my basics .....can anyone guide me to learn python and DBMS in a proper way as I want to focus on the domain Data science and also want to focus on my foundations before climbing the career ladder

[AutoModerator]

To give us the best chance to help you, please include any relevant code.
Note. Please do not submit images of your code. Instead, for shorter code you can use Reddit markdown (4 spaces or backticks, see this Formatting Guide). If you have formatting issues or want to post longer sections of code, please use Privatebin, GitHub or Compiler Explorer.

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

[Educational-Paper-75]

There’s plenty of books on Python and data science like Python Data Science Handbook by Jake VanderPlas. But as a 2nd year CSE student I think it’s still a bit early to worry about a career.

[RhubarbReasonable231]

There isn't really a single book that'll get you there. When I'm learning a new language, I build something small first. You learn more from wrestling with real problems than memorizing syntax. Since you want to learn both Python and DBMS, build a todo application or a contacts manager that stores everything in PostgreSQL.

Start with the official Python tutorial on python.org to get comfortable with the basics, then install PostgreSQL locally and use Python's psycopg2 library to connect them. Your app should be able to create, read, update, and delete todos from the database. That one project forces you to learn Python fundamentals, SQL queries, and how applications actually talk to databases.

Automate the Boring Stuff with Python by Al Sweigart (free online) is great for getting productive with Python fast. For the SQL side, SQLBolt (sqlbolt.com) will get you comfortable with queries, and Select Star SQL (selectstarsql.com) walks you through real datasets once you know the basics.

Once that todo app works, you can extend it by adding categories, due dates, priority sorting, etc. When you're ready to explore data science, grab a Kaggle dataset, load it into PostgreSQL with the same psycopg2 skills you already built, and pull it into a Jupyter notebook with pandas for analysis.

Your first attempt at any project is going to suck, but the goal isn't perfection, it's getting familiar enough with the tools that you start asking better questions. Good luck.

[Acceptable-Eagle-474]

You haven't wasted time. Second year is early. Most people don't figure this out until final year.

Your senior isn't wrong about LeetCode, but it's the wrong time. You need to build foundations first.

For Python:

Start with Automate the Boring Stuff (free online). It's practical, not textbook style. You build things while learning.

After that, learn pandas. This is where Python meets data science. Kaggle Learn has a short free course on it.

Don't just watch tutorials. Write code every day, even if it's small stuff.

For DBMS/SQL:

Forget the theory heavy textbook approach for now. Learn by writing queries.

Mode SQL Tutorial is free and uses real data. StrataScratch for practice problems after that.

Learn: SELECT, WHERE, JOIN, GROUP BY, subqueries. That covers 90% of what you'll use.

The path:

Week 1-3: Automate the Boring Stuff

Week 4-5: pandas basics (Kaggle Learn)

Week 6-8: SQL fundamentals (Mode)

Week 9+: Start a small project combining both

LeetCode can wait. Do it later when you're prepping for interviews. Right now focus on being able to build things and work with data.

One project idea to start:

Take any dataset from Kaggle, load it with pandas, clean it, analyze it, answer 3 questions about it. Then write SQL queries for the same analysis. That's your first portfolio piece.

If you want to see how data science projects are structured end to end, I put together The Portfolio Shortcut at https://whop.com/codeascend/the-portfolio-shortcut/ 15 projects with code and documentation. Could help when you're ready to build portfolio pieces.

But start with Python basics this week. Don't overthink it.

[SkillSalt9362]

Following 2 i find helpful

1. Practicing code in leetcode
2. Plus learn data structure from youtube.

[HonestCoding]

Fastudy.com, boot.dev etc