For the C++ affecianodas, Jupyter/IPython notebook allows you also to install C++ and run codes written in this language interactively in the browser. Since we will emphasize writing many of the algorithms yourself, you can thus opt for either Python or C++ as programming languages.
To add more entropy, cython can also be used when running your notebooks. It means that Python with the Jupyter/IPython notebook setup allows you to integrate widely popular softwares and tools for scientific computing. With its versatility, including symbolic operations, Python offers a unique computational environment. Your Jupyter/IPython notebook can easily be converted into a nicely rendered PDF file or a Latex file for further processing. For example, convert to latex as
jupyter nbconvert filename.ipynb --to latex
If you use the light mark-up language doconce you can convert a standard ascii text file into various HTML formats, ipython notebooks, latex files, pdf files etc.