Required Textbook: The textbook used is an online textbook, the subscription costs $58. The book will be used for Homework worth 5% of the overall grade. Here are the instructions on how to get the book. You can do this any time after January 11, 2021. Subscriptions will last until May 28, 2021.
If, for some reason, you cannot pay for the book immediately, mail to support@zyante.com and explain your situation. They can usually give you a couple weeks' free access, until you can pay for the book. Do not miss homework deadlines and assume you can make them up later.
Required Software: The main programming environment will be Python 3.x. This software is free and available from www.python.org. The software will be available on computers in many labs on campus and is available to all students in the class for free download. Make sure that you get version 3.9.1 of Python, not version 2! See here for more details about Python. Apple Macintosh computer owners, be especially careful! your computer may already come with version 2.x. You still need to install Python 3.9.1.
A recommended IDE for Python is Wing 101. It is free. It does not crash as often as the IDE provided with the Python interpreter (IDLE). Here is the link to the page where you can download it. There are versions for Windows, Linux and OS X there. Be careful to get the 101 version of WingIDE - they also have professional and shareware versions which are NOT free.
If you prefer to use another IDE, there are several available for free. But note that Wing IDE will be the one used in lectures and lab demos.
Note that you have to install Python as well as Wing! Wing does not include Python.