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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 005.133
EAN: 9780596002817
Edition: 2
Format: Illustrated
ISBN: 0596002815
Label: O'Reilly Media, Inc.
Manufacturer: O'Reilly Media, Inc.
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 552
Publication Date: 2003-12
Publisher: O'Reilly Media, Inc.
Studio: O'Reilly Media, Inc.

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Editorial Review:

Amazon.com Review:
The authors of Learning Python show you enough essentials of the Python scripting language to enable you to begin solving problems right away, then reveal more powerful aspects of the language one at a time. This approach is sure to appeal to programmers and system administrators who have urgent problems and a preference for learning by semi-guided experimentation.

First off, Learning Python shows the relationships among Python scripts and their interpreter (in a mostly platform-neutral way). Then, the authors address the mechanics of the language itself, providing illustrations of how Python conceives of numbers, strings, and other objects as well as the operators you use to work with them. Dictionaries, lists, tuples, and other data structures specific to Python receive plenty of attention including complete examples.

Authors Mark Lutz and David Ascher build on that fundamental information in their discussions of functions and modules, which evolve into coverage of namespaces, classes, and the object-oriented aspects of Python programming. There's also information on creating graphical user interfaces (GUIs) for Python applications with Tkinter.

In addition to its careful expository prose, Learning Python includes exercises that both test your Python skills and help reveal more elusive truths about the language.

Product Description:
Thoroughly updated, Learning Python, Second Edition introduces the basic elements of the latest release of Python 2.3 and covers new features, such as list comprehensions, nested scopes, and iterators/generators. Beyond language features, it also includes new context for less-experienced programmers, including fresh overviews of object-oriented programming and dynamic typing, new discussions of program launch and configuration options, new coverage of documentation sources, and more. There are also new use cases throughout to make the application of language features more concrete. The first part of Learning Python gives programmers all the information they'll need to understand and construct programs in the Python language, including types, operators, statements, classes, functions, modules and exceptions. The authors then present more advanced material, showing how Python performs common tasks by offering real applications and the libraries available for those applications. Each chapter ends with a series of exercises that will test your Python skills and measure your understanding.




Rating: - Is this really from O'Reilly?
This is the first O'Reilly book that I will say that I regret purchasing. Coming from Perl and now trying to see what the hype with Python is about. I know Java as well as C++, so I understand OO and all it is supposed to do.

So far I am on page 200 and I still can't do a darn thing with the language. Instead the author chooses to spend pages explaining how python handles objects in memory (not sure how I supposed to understand what an object is if I never did another language). ... Read More

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Rating: - Wordy
This book should be called "Learning Python for people who have never programmed before". The author states in the preface that no assumptions have been made about the reader's programming background. I think that this is why this book is so wordy.

Amazon's opening statement: "The authors of Learning Python show you enough essentials of the Python scripting language to enable you to begin solving problems right away..." Well, not right away. You have to read half the book first. The ... Read More

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Rating: - Comprehensive but rather wordy
I have learned Python through this book, but to be honest, it wasn't very pleasant (although that's mostly because I was impatient). The book is comprehensive, but it's rather wordy. The two combined mean that it becomes one really huge book. Due to the length, it will take commitment to read through the whole thing, and in my opinion, for the first time learning, there's no need to go through this much detail. That said, I much prefer reading something easier like Byte of Python and use this book for ... Read More

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Rating: - The Ultimate Reference For A Python Learner
This book with its well organized, top-down, explanatory approach is the ultimate reference for the student new to the Python Language. For each major feature of the language a complete explanation is given including a description of why this feature is implemented in the way that it is, and a "Brain Builder" set of thought questions to reinforce this knowledge. In taking this complete explanatory approach to explaining Python this volume may not offer the most efficient tutorial path for a new learner, ... Read More

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Rating: - Best Book For Python Beginners
Very well written and easy to understand. One of he best introductory programming books I have read. If you want to learn Python this book will help. However to master any programming language you need to practice and write programs. I would recommend opening python and following along with the author.

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