Python Refresher — Lab
Pre-course reading
| Notebook | Colab | Download |
|---|---|---|
| Exercises |  | .ipynb |
| Solutions | | .ipynb |
Open the Exercises notebook in Colab (or download it and run it locally), replace every ... with your code, and compare your results with the ✅ Check values given at the end of each exercise. Use plain Python only: NumPy comes in Week 1.
Run Runtime → Restart and run all. If the notebook runs from top to bottom without errors and your values match the checks, you're ready for Week 1.
Exercises
| # | Exercise | Python skills | Lecture sections |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Flow in a pipe | variables, arithmetic, f-strings, if / elif | §2, §4 |
| 2 | A month of rainfall | lists, comprehensions, for loops with counters | §3, §4 |
| 3 | Gauging stations | dictionaries, list of dicts, max with key | §3, §5 |
| 4 | Flow regimes along a spillway | functions, default arguments, tuple unpacking | §5 |
| 5 | Friction losses in a pipe | iterative solution, returning several values | §4, §5 |
| 6 | Cleaning sensor readings | try / except, raising ValueError | §6 |
| 7 | Saving the clean data | reading and writing files with with | §8 |
1. Flow in a pipe
Compute the flow area, velocity and Reynolds number of a pipe flow, print them with their units, and classify the flow as laminar, transitional or turbulent.
2. A month of rainfall
From a month of daily rainfall, compute the total and the wettest day, count the rainy days, and find the longest dry spell.
3. Gauging stations
Add the specific discharge (L/s/km²) to a list of station records, find the station with the largest value, sum the catchment areas, and build a lookup table by station code.
4. Flow regimes along a spillway
Write froude() and regime() functions, then classify measured sections from the upstream channel to the stilling basin.
5. Friction losses in a pipe
Solve the implicit Colebrook–White equation by fixed-point iteration, compare it with the explicit Swamee–Jain formula, and compute the Darcy–Weisbach head loss.
6. Cleaning sensor readings
Turn a messy text export from a water-level logger into clean numbers, rejecting missing, erroneous and physically impossible values.
7. Saving the clean data
Write the cleaned readings to a text file and read them back.