Phase 1 foundations: the two libraries every later machine learning episode assumes you already know. This is array and dataframe fluency, not modeling yet. **NumPy.** Why Python lists are slow for numbers (boxed objects, pointer-chasing) and why the `ndarray` is fast (contiguous typed memory, vectorized C loops, BLAS/LAPACK). Anatomy of an array: dtype, shape, strides, and why slicing returns a view. Creating arrays (`arange`, `linspace`, `zeros`, `random.default_rng`), ufuncs and vectorization, broadcasting rules and the `(3,)` vs `(3,1)` pitfall, views vs copies (slices are views, fancy/boolean indexing copies), the `axis` argument, and linear algebra (`@` vs `*`, `np.linalg.solve` for the normal equations). Pitfalls: silent integer overflow, NaN propagation, float equality (`np.isclose`), and ragged arrays. **pandas.** What it adds over NumPy: labeled axes, heterogeneous columns, missing data, time series, and relational ops. Reading data with `read_csv` (`parse_dates`, `dtype`, `na_values`), `.loc` vs `.iloc`, boolean filtering, the historical `SettingWithCopyWarning` and why Copy-on-Write replaced it, missing data handling, split-apply-combine with `groupby`, merge/join/concat and many-to-many explosions, vectorized `.str` and `.dt`, reshaping and tidy data, categoricals, method chaining, and the PyArrow backend. Crossing back to ML with `df.to_numpy()`. **Version notes:** [NumPy 2.0](https://numpy.org/doc/2.2/release/2.0.0-notes.html) (June 2024, NEP-50 promotion, `StringDType`), current line 2.4.x, and [pandas 3.0](https://pandas.pydata.org/community/blog/pandas-3.0.html) (January 2026: Copy-on-Write is the only mode, `SettingWithCopyWarning` removed, string dtype by default, non-nanosecond datetimes). See [What's new in pandas 3.0](https://pandas.pydata.org/docs/whatsnew/v3.0.0.html) and [InfoQ's coverage](https://www.infoq.com/news/2026/02/pandas-library/). **News roundup.** SpaceX agreed to acquire Cursor parent Anysphere for $60B all-stock ([CNBC](https://www.cnbc.com/2026/06/16/spacex-spcx-cursor-acquisition-ipo.html), [Fortune](https://fortune.com/2026/06/16/elon-musk-spacex-ipo-ai-coding-startup-cursor-acquisition/)). Tencent reportedly backed ex-Qwen lead Junyang Lin's new world-models lab ([Techmeme](https://www.techmeme.com/260617/p8)). AI leaders met G7 at Evian on voluntary commitments ([CNBC](https://www.cnbc.com/2026/06/17/g7-trump-ai-tech-leaders-openai-anthropic-google.html)). OpenAI published [Deployment Simulation](https://openai.com/index/deployment-simulation/). And [Gemini API preview image/video models](https://www.buildfastwithai.com/blogs/ai-news-today-june-17-2026) are slated to shut down late June 2026.