Soumitra Dutta Oxford-How can I fix errors in my Python notebook assignments?

AI Discussions
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Hi Everyone, I am Soumitra Dutta an entrepreneur & photographer from Oxford, I’m currently facing some errors in my Python notebook assignments and I’m trying to understand the best way to debug and fix them. if you could share your suggestions, debugging tips, or common practices you follow when troubleshooting notebook assignments.

Regards
Soumitra Dutta

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Hi Soumitra,

Welcome to the community! Happy to help you work through those errors.

To give you the most relevant guidance, could you share a few details?

  • Which course and module is this assignment from? (e.g., “Deep Learning Specialization, Course 4, Week 2”)

  • The exact error message/traceback you’re seeing

  • Which cell is throwing the error (a screenshot works great)

In the meantime, here are the most common issues learners run into with notebook assignments:

  1. Stale kernel state — Cells run out of order cause hidden bugs. Try Kernel → Restart & Run All before anything else. If it fails on a clean run, that’s your real error.

  2. Edits outside the code markers — Only modify code between ### START CODE HERE ### and ### END CODE HERE ###. Accidentally changing anything outside those markers (even a stray space) can break the grader.

  3. Shape mismatches — Add a quick print(variable.shape) before the failing line. Most dimension errors become obvious once you see the actual shapes vs. what’s expected.

  4. Not using the function parameters — A common mistake is using hardcoded variable names from earlier cells instead of the function’s own parameters. Always use the arguments passed into the function.

  5. Check the instructions again — Sometimes the assignment specifies a particular function (e.g., tf.keras.layers.Dense vs tf.keras.layers.Activation) or a specific axis argument. Re-reading the markdown cells right above your code often clears things up.

Once you share the course and error details, we can pinpoint the exact fix for you.

Regards, Arman

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The first step is to post a message in the Forum topic for that course, instead of using the “AI Discussions” topic.

The mentors and staff for that course will be more easily able to find it that way.