Python in a Nutshell

by Martelli, Alex

• ISBN13: 9780596100469
• ISBN10: 0596100469
• Edition: 2nd
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2006-07-01
• Publisher: Oreilly & Associates Inc

Summary

This book offers Python programmers one place to look when they need help remembering or deciphering the syntax of this open source language and its many powerful but scantily documented modules. This comprehensive reference guide makes it easy to look up the most frequently needed information--not just about

Author Biography

Alex Martelli spent 8 years with IBM Research, winning three Outstanding Technical Achievement Awards. He then spent 13 as a Senior Software Consultant at think3 inc, developing libraries, network protocols, GUI engines, event frameworks, and web access frontends. He has also taught programming languages, development methods, and numerical computing at Ferrara University and other venues. He's a C++ MVP for Brainbench, and a member of the Python Software Foundation. He currently works for AB Strakt, a Python-centered software house in G teborg, Sweden, mostly by telecommuting from his home in Bologna, Italy. Alex's proudest achievement is the articles that appeared in Bridge World (January/February 2000), which were hailed as giant steps towards solving issues that had haunted contract bridge theoreticians for decades.

Table of Contents

Preface	ix
Part I. Getting Started with Python
1. Introduction to Python	3	(11)
The Python Language	3	(2)
The Python Standard Library and Extension Modules	5	(1)
Python Implementations	5	(3)
Python Development and Versions	8	(1)
Python Resources	9	(5)
2. Installation	14	(8)
Installing Python from Source Code	14	(4)
Installing Python from Binaries	18	(2)
Installing Jython	20	(1)
Installing IronPython	21	(1)
3. The Python Interpreter	22	(11)
The python Program	22	(4)
Python Development Environments	26	(2)
Running Python Programs	28	(1)
The Jython Interpreter	29	(1)
The IronPython Interpreter	30	(3)
Part II. Core Python Language and Built-ins
4. The Python Language	33	(48)
Lexical Structure	33	(5)
Data Types	38	(8)
Variables and Other References	46	(4)
Expressions and Operators	50	(2)
Numeric Operations	52	(1)
Sequence Operations	53	(5)
Set Operations	58	(1)
Dictionary Operations	59	(2)
The print Statement	61	(1)
Control Flow Statements	62	(8)
Functions	70	(11)
5. Object-Oriented Python	81	(40)
Classes and Instances	82	(22)
Special Methods	104	(11)
Decorators	115	(1)
Metaclasses	116	(5)
6. Exceptions	121	(18)
The try Statement	121	(5)
Exception Propagation	126	(2)
The raise Statement	128	(1)
Exception Objects	129	(3)
Custom Exception Classes	132	(2)
Error-Checking Strategies	134	(5)
7. Modules	139	(14)
Module Objects	139	(5)
Module Loading	144	(5)
Packages	149	(1)
The Distribution Utilities (distutils)	150	(3)
8. Core Built-ins	153	(33)
Built-in Types	154	(4)
Built-in Functions	158	(10)
The sys Module	168	(4)
The copy Module	172	(1)
The collections Module	173	(2)
The functional Module	175	(1)
The bisect Module	176	(1)
The heapq Module	177	(1)
The UserDict Module	178	(1)
The optparse Module	179	(4)
The itertools Module	183	(3)
9. Strings and Regular Expressions	186
Methods of String Objects	186	(5)
The string Module	191	(2)
String Formatting	193	(4)
The pprint Module	197	(1)
The repr Module	198	(1)
Unicode	198	(3)
Regular Expressions and the re Module	201	(14)
Part III. Python Library and Extension Modules
10. File and Text Operations	215	(62)
Other Chapters That Also Deal with Files	215	(1)
Organization of This Chapter	215	(1)
File Objects	216	(8)
Auxiliary Modules for File I/O	224	(5)
The StringIO and cStringIO Modules	229	(1)
Compressed Files	230	(10)
The os Module	240	(1)
Filesystem Operations	241	(15)
Text Input and Output	256	(2)
Richer-Text I/O	258	(7)
Interactive Command Sessions	265	(4)
Internationalization	269	(8)
11. Persistence and Databases	277	(25)
Serialization	278	(7)
DBM Modules	285	(3)
Berkeley DB Interfacing	288	(4)
The Python Database API (DBAPI) 2.0	292	(10)
12. Time Operations	302	(26)
The time Module	302	(4)
The datetime Module	306	(7)
The pytz Module	313	(1)
The dateutil Module	313	(3)
The sched Module	316	(1)
The calendar Module	317	(2)
The mx.DateTime Module	319	(9)
13. Controlling Execution	328	(12)
Dynamic Execution and the exec Statement	328	(3)
Internal Types	331	(1)
Garbage Collection	332	(5)
Termination Functions	337	(1)
Site and User Customization	338	(2)
14. Threads and Processes	340	(25)
Threads in Python	341	(1)
The thread Module	341	(1)
The Queue Module	342	(2)
The threading Module	344	(6)
Threaded Program Architecture	350	(3)
Process Environment	353	(1)
Running Other Programs	354	(6)
The mmap Module	360	(5)
15. Numeric Processing	365	(10)
The math and cmath Modules	365	(3)
The operator Module	368	(2)
Random and Pseudorandom Numbers	370	(2)
The decimal Module	372	(1)
The gmpy Module	373	(2)
16. Array Processing	375	(30)
The array Module	375	(2)
Extensions for Numeric Array Computation	377	(1)
The Numeric Package	378	(1)
Array Objects	378	(21)
Universal Functions (ufuncs)	399	(4)
Auxiliary Numeric Modules	403	(2)
17. Tkinter GUIs	405	(46)
Tkinter Fundamentals	406	(2)
Widget Fundamentals	408	(7)
Commonly Used Simple Widgets	415	(5)
Container Widgets	420	(3)
Menus	423	(3)
The Text Widget	426	(10)
The Canvas Widget	436	(6)
Layout Management	442	(4)
Tkinter Events	446	(5)
18. Testing, Debugging, and Optimizing	451	(42)
Testing	452	(9)
Debugging	461	(10)
The warnings Module	471	(3)
Optimization	474	(19)
Part IV. Network and Web Programming
19. Client-Side Network Protocol Modules	493	(27)
URL Access	493	(10)
Email Protocols	503	(3)
The HTTP and FTP Protocols	506	(5)
Network News	511	(4)
Telnet	515	(1)
Distributed Computing	516	(3)
Other Protocols	519	(1)
20. Sockets and Server-Side Network Protocol Modules	520	(25)
The socket Module	521	(7)
The SocketServer Module	528	(5)
Event-Driven Socket Programs	533	(12)
21. CGI Scripting and Alternatives	545	(16)
CGI in Python	546	(7)
Cookies	553	(4)
Other Server-Side Approaches	557	(4)
22. MIME and Network Encodings	561	(14)
Encoding Binary Data as Text	561	(3)
MIME and Email Format Handling	564	(11)
23. Structured Text: HTML	575	(16)
The sgmllib Module	576	(4)
The htmllib Module	580	(3)
The HTMLParser Module	583	(2)
The BeautifulSoup Extension	585	(1)
Generating HTML	586	(5)
24. Structured Text: XML	591	(22)
An Overview of XML Parsing	592	(1)
Parsing XML with SAX	593	(6)
Parsing XML with DOM	599	(7)
Changing and Generating XML	606	(7)
Part V. Extending and Embedding
25. Extending and Embedding Classic Python	613	(42)
Extending Python with Python's C API	614	(31)
Extending Python Without Python's C API	645	(2)
Embedding Python	647	(3)
Pyrex	650	(5)
26. Extending and Embedding Jython	655	(11)
Importing Java Packages in Jython	656	(3)
Embedding Jython in Java	659	(3)
Compiling Python into Java	662	(4)
27. Distributing Extensions and Programs	666	(11)
Python's distutils	666	(9)
py2exe	675	(1)
py2app	676	(1)
cx_Freeze	676	(1)
PyInstaller	676	(1)
Index	677