Using the course notebook environment

Prerequisites

In order to use the course environment, you must have a Google account that is associated with your @rhodes.edu email.

That is, when you log in to Google, instead of supplying a @gmail.com address, you supply your @rhodes.edu address. You will almost certainly have to create this, using the following instructions.

In order to do so, visit the account sign up page at Google.

  1. On this page, choose “Use my current email instead” (see picture below) and sign up for an account using your Rhodes email address.

    Use current email

  2. Continue with account creation. Make sure to set your recovery email address or your phone number in case you forget your password.
  3. Using your new Rhodes email Google account, you can now log in to rhodes-notebook.org or okpy.org (I will enroll everyone in the latter after the first Friday of the class).

The course environment

In this course you will use Jupyter and Jupyter notebooks for in-class exercises and programming lab assignments; this environment is provided for you as a hosted service and is accessible anywhere you have a web browser at rhodes-notebook.org.

You will also be using okpy.org to submit lab assignments. The OK site was originally designed for UC Berkeley’s CS1, and allows you to submit assignments directly from your project notebook. It also provides functionality where you can test you solutions in your notebook before submitting. After submitting, you can visit the site to receive feedback and grading information from me.

Before the first lab is assigned, I will have enrolled all of you in the course on OK using your Rhodes email address.

After submitting a lab, keep an eye on your email. You’ll receive email from OK when I release grades and comments for labs.

Fixing stuck notebooks

When the notebook is waiting to execute a cell, you’ll see an asterisk next to the cell. Sometimes a notebook can get “stuck” in a state where it is waiting to execute a cell. This usually happens because you have asked for input, but then re-ran the cell before entering input. When the notebook gets stuck, you should press either the stop or reset buttons in the toolbar. This video demonstrates me getting a notebook stuck, and then fixing it.