Weekly Python Learning Recap – Week 1

Kicking off a new set of journal entries where I’m working through Automate the Boring Stuff with Python to strengthen my logic and programming skills. Been in management for close to 6 years now and I’m beginning to feel my logic skills atrophy. I’m hoping that by working through this book on a weekly basis while practicing Leetcode-style questions will help sharpen those skills to the point of where I was 5 years ago.

I plan to keep a log here and continue to learn in public. I’ll be tracking the progress this Github repo.

🗓️ Dates Covered:

• 2025-04-14 - 2025-04-20

📚 What I Studied

• Chapter(s) covered: 2, 3, 4
• Concepts I focused on: Lists, sets, and problem solving logic
• Challenges or problems attempted:
  • All of the questions and problems at the end of each chapter
  • Worked with ChatGPT to come up with Leetcode style problems to test my logic, such as:
    • Finding repeatable streaks in a list of strings or numbers
    • Determining if a list of numbers is mirrored
    • Filtering a list based on a starting string

🧠 What I Learned

• Key takeaways:
  • A set() in Python can store unique values when looping through a collection
  • A Tuple (23, 14, 15) is an immutable data type that is similar to a list, but cannot be modified
  • Slow down. Write the problem down. Try writing in English and sketching.

🔁 Repeated Patterns or Skills Practiced

• Continuing to practice set logic and working with lists
• Using the sorted() function to ensure we don’t share duplicate values in a set
• Thinking through how we compare weights by examining what is in a given set

⚔️ Challenges I Faced

• Problem(s) that tripped me up:

  • Determining if the list was mirrored or not.
  • Getting frustrated by the logic questions and feeling dumb.

• What I misunderstood at first:

  • I didn’t think to split it by half instead of comparing the entire list.
  • That I’m never going to get this.

• How I solved or reframed it:

  • Thought that checking the second half of the list would be a waste as that’s what we checked in the first half through our indexing
  • Chatting with ChatGPT to break down the problems, slowly.

✅ Wins of the Week

• When I finally understood how the find_dagger_pair function was working by comparing the weights of the items in a set
• Continuing to dedicate time to this and pushing through the discomfort

🔮 What’s Next

• Topics I plan to tackle next week:
  • Chapter 5 and continuing to nail down the logic problems
• Goals for the next 7 days:
  • Work on 2 logic problems per day
• Questions or curiosities I want to explore:
  • How do I get better at these logic puzzles without getting frustrated?

🧾 Favorite Snippet of the Week

def find_dagger_pair(weights, limit):
    seen = set()

    for i, w in enumerate(weights):
        complement = limit - w
        if complement in seen:
            return [complement, w]
        else:
            seen.add(w)

    print("🛑 Finished searching. No two daggers found that add up to the limit.\n")
    return None