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Introduction to Python and it’s brief history

Python is a general purpose high-level programming language. It is very easy to learn and has very simple syntax and that is why it is very popular.

Python provides high-level and efficient data structures.

Python is interpreted and dynamically typed. Python supports multiple programming paradigms, including object-oriented, procedural and functional programming. Python also supports features like garbage collection, exception handling and multi-threading.

Python code is simple to write. Python can be used in small as well as big projects. Python has a very comprehensive and extensive library. Python is becoming very popular due to its implementation in Artificial Intelligence, Data Science and machine learning projects in addition to development of desktop and web applications.

History of Python and major versions

Python was created by Guido van Rossum in Netherlands. Python was conceived as a successor of ABC language. It’s development began in 1989 and was first appeared in 1990.

  • Python 1.0 was released in 1994.
  • Python 2.0 was released in 2000.
  • Python 3.0 was released in 2008. This version was a major version release and not backward compatible.

At the time of writing this tutorial latest version of Python 3.8.2.

Why name “Python”

Guido van Rossum, chose name Python from “Monty Python’s Flying Circus”, a BBC comedy series from the 1970s. Van Rossum thought he needed a name that was short and unique, so he decided to call the language Python.