Physics 91SI

Welcome to Physics 91SI! We look forward to meeting you all tomorrow in class for our first lecture at 4:30-6:20pm in Hewlett 102. The class will be taught using a lecture + lab format, with the first half of the class reserved for lecture, and the second half for testing and applying this material to solving problems. Please remember to bring your laptop to the first day of class, as you will be using it to complete the lab in the second half of the class.

Physics 91SI will focus on providing students with powerful computing tools directly applicable to scientific research. We will begin by introducing you to the Python language, but course topics will include working with Unix, git/Github, and a variety of advanced Python features and libraries for facilitating research. This will not be new information for you, but we ask that enrolled students be somewhat familiar with programming: a CS 106A or AP Computer Science background or the equivalent will be sufficient.

For your information, the class website at physics91si.stanford.edu contains lots of useful information including a description of the course, an executive summary, and the syllabus. This is the location from which we will disseminate most of the course materials, though documents will also eventually be available on the course Github. Please take a moment to visit and browse the materials before the first lecture tomorrow.

We will be sending out an email soon about how to install a few pieces of software that we will be using for this course. Our goal is to provide an even and modern computing workflow for all the students in the course. Although this will not become relevant until Thursday, and especially next Tuesday, please be aware that this is upcoming and reserve some time to follow the installation instructions we will be providing.

Best,

Physics 91SI staff.