image

1NOT ALL SNAKES SLITHER

A computer program is a set of instructions that causes a computer to perform some kind of action. It isn’t the physical parts of a computer—like the wires, microchips, cards, hard drive, and such—but the hidden stuff running on that hardware. A computer program, which I’ll usually refer to as just a program, is the set of commands that tell that dumb hardware what to do. Software is a collection of computer programs.

Without computer programs, almost every device you use daily would either stop working or be much less useful than it is now. Computer programs, in one form or another, control not only your personal computer ...

Get Python for Kids now with the O’Reilly learning platform.

O’Reilly members experience books, live events, courses curated by job role, and more from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers.