Pragamtic Python

The podcast can be found at:

Python411 Podcast Series

Here are the links for sites mentioned in the podcast:

the Python Challenge

Bruce, the Presentation Tool

Activestate for Komodo IDE

WingIDE

Bruce Eckel's comments

Enjoy!

PyGoogle

Here are some links to sites metioned in teh latest Python411 podcast:

pyGoogle
Python interface to the Google API

flickr.py
Python interface to the flickr API

Beej's Flickr API
an alternative Python interface to the flickr API

del.icio.us experiments using Python
hackdiary site

PyYahoo
hackdiary site

Googly.py
Googly.py

Google neighborhood

pyigs or Python for Google Suggest
hackdiary site

PyAmazon

A Python wrapper for the Amazon web API. Allows you to do Amazon searches by keyword, ASIN, UPC, author, artist, actor, director, manufacturer, list, similar, or best seller.

PyBlogger

A Python wrapper for the Blogger API

PyGoogle

A Python wrapper for the Google web API. Allows you to do Google searches, retrieve pages from the Google cache, and ask
Google for spelling suggestions.

PyManila

A Python wrapper for the Manila API. Allows you to script your Manila site via XML-RPC. Supports complete Manila remote
scripting specification, including access to over 350 preferences.

PySiteStats

PySiteStats generates reports from Apache-style access logs. It is specifically geared towards weblog-ish sites, but it should
work with access logs from any type of site.

PyTechnorati

A Python wrapper for the Technorati web API. Allows you to search Technorati for incoming links to a tracked site (such as a weblog).

PyTextile

A Python port of Textile, Dean Allen's Human Web Text Generator.

Magic: List Comprehensions, Iterators, Generators, Generator Expressions, Decorators and Sets

Subscribe to the podcasts at Python411 .

Links mentioned in the show:

MIT Lectures on Structure and Interpreatation of Computer Programs

Wax

Python Scripts

Checkout our latest Python411 podcast at Python411 and try our updated Ask Merlin online scripts at Decision Vision

Also, Doug Kaye over at IT Conversations is looking for Python coders to help create a new podcast creation and managment software tool, youi can join teh discussion and the mailing list over at Blogarithms

Drop me a line over on the AwareTek discussion forum also..

Top 10 Python Web Sites

Here they are!

1. Python Home Page

2. The Python Newsgroup

3. Planet Python

4. Daily Python-URL

5. Fredrik Lundh's weffbot.org site

6. PyZine

7. The Vaults of Parnassus

8. Dr. David Mertz' Gnosis Software's Articles on Pythonic Programming

9. del.icio.us/tag/python

10. AwareTek's Python Learning Foundation

Choose your Programming Language:

Java, Visual Basic, C#, JavaScript, PHP, Lisp/Scheme, C/C++, Perl, Python, or Ruby?

Python411: Firedrop2 Podcast

Firedrop2 is a weblogging and content management system written in Python by Hans Nowak and supplemented by Fuzzyman with a plugin system. Open source and extensible in Python, Firedrop2 is good tool and a worthwhile learning exercise. This podcast helps you to install Firedrop2 and get started creating your blog.

Firedrop2 Podcast

rss to subscibe to this podcast series

Vote for Python411 at PodcastAlley

These links below are indispensable aids;

Firedrop2 Mini-How To Tutorial by me

Download wxPython

Download wax and Firedrop2

Fuzzyman's Plugins Tutorial

Hans Nowak's Firedrop2 Docs

python on technorati

Announcing Python411, a New Series of Podcasts about Python, Coming Real Soon Now

I am planning a series of Python411 podcasts dedicated 100% to Python. These podcasts will be most appropriate for newcomers and learners of Python or even those who haven't yet decided which language to learn next, or first. The series should begin with episodes such as an Introduction to Python, Why Python?, Comparison of Python to other languages, Python GUI toolsets, Python for Mobile Systems, and Python IDE's.

I will also likely include a podcast or two about Firedrop and how to set it up and use it for blogging, podcasting, or as a content management tool.

As I indicated above, this series will be named "Python411" and will be completely separate from my AwareTek series of Podcasts.

New Podcast and New Directions

I have posted a new podcast and it represents the last experimental podcast, now I am ready to begin. I have decided to have two series of regular podcasts: one called Python411 will be information about Python particularly suited to new learner's. The other will exercise my more creative and artistic musings about the Future, and is called called just "AwareTek".

Meanwhile, I have found Firedrop to be particularly good as a tool to help me manage my podcasts. I will post some details about this in the near future and also do a podcast or two about how to customize and use Firedrop2 for podcasting. These Firedrop audio tutorials will be in the Python411 series of podcasts.

More real soon now...

New Python Tutorials Proliferate: Now Up To 180+

There have been a lot of good new tutorials appearing on the web lately. My Python Tutorials Page now has links to more than 180 such tutorials, carefully categorized and organized for your convenience.

New Podcasts and other thoughts

I have posted three new podcasts to my front page. Podcasting is alot of fun. The three podcasts are sort of "about" politics, business, philosophy, culture and spirituality, with a little poetry thrown in for good measure. Really, uncategorizable ;-))

I will post more soon, including an introduction to Python for non-programmers and newbies, as well as some other Python tips and information.

I am thinking that Firedrop will also be great content management and publishing system for podcasters, as well as bloggers, and I am planning some tweaks and adjustments to the Firedrop software to customize it for managing podcast content.

Python Liberation Front

This site is returning to its original name. Hooray! Maybe "Python Liberation Front" is not too controversial after all, wasn't Python named after a Monty Python???

Python for Mobile Devices: Applications, Tools, and News

Python for Mobile Devices is the beginning of a section of this site dedicated to the coverage of Python software for mobile devices, including applications, developer tools, and news. For now, I am collecting and organizing links to the available applications and tools for as many mobile platforms as possible, which currently includes the Apple iPod, the Nokia Series 60 cell phone, the Palm PDA platform, Pocket PC (WinCE), and the Sharp Zaurus. You can expect the information on this site to grow rapidly because I am going to be putting some thought into writing mobile apps using Python and I am also about to take the plunge and buy my first iPod, now that I realize that the iPod is a Python hacker's delight ;-)))

Mobile Applications

I am quite interested in writing little apps for mobile devices. So far, I have written some for my Sharp Zaurus using Riverbanks Python. Now, I am looking at Nokia’s Python for Series 60 Phones.

See also Mobile Python on the Mac OS X for a good setup how-to for Nokia’s python on the Mac.

Yahoo Search API's for Python

Yahoo has introduced a new search API that allows Python, as well as other languages, access to programming the search engine. I have previously used Google’s API for the same thing, creating scripts like Ask Merlin.

Yahoo’s API offers more options in some ways, as in video, local, image, news, and web search methods; and allows 5000 interrogations of the search engine per day, compared to the Google 1000 per day. And yes, I have exceeded the Google limit more than once ;-))).

I plan to explore Yahoo’s API, and I have some innovative ideas to try out. I will certainly offer up my scripts on this web site. As I am traveling overseas right now and quite busy with my day job, it may be a little while before I can complete anything.

Yahoo’s API can be found at Yahoo API and another interesting link is Yahoo Search Python API How-To.

pyGoogle is fun and easy to use and my program Ask Merlin is an example of this.

I am having a lot of fun using the pyGoogle module that uses the Google API. It is about as easy to use as I can imagine, and it is a lot nicer than using my old HTMl screen scraping habits.

My online CGI program Ask Merlin is an example. Currently, the program takes any user's question and picks the best answer from amongst the possible answers given by the user. The program uses an algorithm that uses an intelligent analysis of search results from Google. OK, OK, I know already, that this is of limited utility compared to answering any question without requiring the user to give options to choose from; and, furthermore i know full well that at this point Merlin is far from foolproof even when given options to choose amongst. Still, if you play with it for a while you will be amazed at how well it does do.

Moreover, I am hard at work on a version that will answer any question without being given options, by choosing options from Google search results that are most appropriate and then applying my "intelligent" algorithm.

But hey, even as it stands, when queried "which is the best programming language to use for ease of use," Merlin picks Python from amongst a list of python, ruby, ADA and java. When queried "which language is the best programming language to use for a large project requiring realtime operation and involving life and death issues of human life", Merlin picks ada out of the same list. And, when just plain asked "what is the best programming language" Merlin wisely picks Python from the list. And I assure you that none of this is "hard coded" but instead just uses the regular algorithm applied to any other question ;-))))

OK, it's just a fun little hack by a very amateurish hacker; but that's sort of the point. Just think what a good programmer could do with pyGoogle ;-))))

Possible Python Projects:

I am thinking about three python projects, to explore in my copious spare time ;-)))

1. Create a web inteface for pyChing. The pyChing program is a nice implentation of the I Ching coded in Python and Tkinter. I would like to replace the Tkinter interface with a web based interface.

2. Create a Google Box that works seemlessly with FireDrop2, to allow the user to do regular customized searches for the most recent web activity on specific topics. I will admit that Feedster does most of what I have in mind, adn I highly recommend Feedster. However, I want to integrate this fiunctionality into FireDrop created websites.

3. Creating a (Jython created) Java .class versiuonj of my latest Decision Analysis program optimized for cell phones and PDA's.

the Happy Hacker: Do Not Emulate this Code

Well, the AskMerlin script is running and it works fine. It's fun but raw. The source code (so you can see how it works) is available at either

Ask Merlin, source code for command line version, requires pyGoogle and a valid Google API license number or,

alternatively, here is the source code for a simpler version that does not require pyGoogle nor a Google API license, Ask Merlin, stand alone version

I will do more work on it before Christmas, to refine the algorithm. Meanwhile, who says you can't write spaghetti code with Python?

Some hints and results: The more detailed you make your question, especially the more key words you give, the more meaningful will be Merlin's answer. Curious results:

When asked "Is there a God?" and given the possible choices "Yes, No, Maybe", Merlin answers "Maybe". If given only the choices "Yes, No", Merlin answers "Yes". Wise, you say? Well, if you ask "What is the best programming language for ease of use and readability", and give the choices "perl, python, ruby, java" Merlin answers "python". But, if you ask "which is the best programming language for regular expressions and text processing", Merlin answers "perl". Now, If you simply ask, "What is the best programming language, Merlin answers "python".

Merlin will get smarter and wiser over time. Perhaps you'd like to help educate him?

Lightweight Languages 4 at MIT December 4, 2004

I heartily recommend the Lightweight Languages 4 conference at the new Strata center at MIT on December 4. It is free (but it helps to register in advance at the above web site) and does have Python content. My son and I attended LL1, but missed LL2 and LL3, and now we will attend LL4. At LL1, some of the content was way above our heads (especially above my head) but we both still learned an awful lot.

I hope I see some of you there! If so, say hello to me, I'll be wearing a name badge

Ron Stephens
AwareTek

As the LL4 web site states:

LL4 will be an intense, exciting, one-day forum bringing together the best programming language implementors and researchers, from both academia and industry, to exchange ideas and information, to challenge one another, and to learn from one another.

The workshop series focuses on programming languages, tools, and processes that are usable and useful. Lightweight languages have been an effective vehicle for introducing new features to mainstream programmers.

Program committee
Ken Anderson, BBN (co-chair)
David Ascher, ActiveState
Jonathan Edwards,  MIT
Jeremy Hylton, Google (co-chair)
Geoffrey Knauth, SFA Inc.
Shriram Krishnamurthi, Brown University
Greg Sullivan, Alphatech 

Python Tutorials, now almost 100 and sorted by Topic or Category

I have updated my Python Tutorials page with quite a few new ones, and eliminated a few dead links. More importantly, I have now created a clickable menu sorting them by topic and category, as below:

Table of Contents
New Tutorials (14)
For Beginners (10)
General and Advanced (11)
GUI Programming (20)
HTML and XML (4)
CGI and Server-Side Programming (4)
Windows (3)
Database (3)
Math, Science, Physics and Bioinformatics (7)
Mac (3)
Advanced Specific Topics including Idle, Sorting, Unicode, Threads, NumPy, RE, Sockets, Curses, and Boost C ++ (12)
Reference (7)