Dr. Dobb's Python-URL! - weekly Python news and links (Jun 10)

Kragen Sitaker kragen at pobox.com
Mon Jun 10 21:27:10 EDT 2002


QOTW:  "I favour Kent Beck's aphorism: 'Make it work, make it right, make
it fast.'" -- James Kew


Programming Libraries:

    Logilab's 'constraint', a constraint satisfaction problem
    programming environment for Python, which lets you program in
    Prolog style in Python, has released version 0.2.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=mailman.1023468735.788.python-list%40python.org

    Twisted, an event-based framework for Python applications,
    including network servers, has released version 0.18.0.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=mailman.1023121326.9358.clpa-moderators%40python.org

    Rdflib, which includes a store for RDF triples and XML
    serialization facilities for them, has released version 0.9.0.
        http://redfoot.sf.net/

    The proposed standard Python logging module has been released
    version 0.4.5.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=mailman.1023398221.4689.clpa-moderators%40python.org
        http://www.red-dove.com/python_logging.html

    scgi, yet another FastCGI clone, with support in Apache and Python,
    has released verion 0.3.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=mailman.1023213423.29409.clpa-moderators%40python.org

    Skunkweb, a web application framework for Python, has released
    version 3.2.1, which supports Apache 2, among other things.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=mailman.1023380951.25710.python-list%40python.org

Python Development News

    Oleg BroytMann posted glue that automatically moves vim users to
    the locations of syntax errors in their Python source code, much
    like C-c - in Emacs.
        mailman.1023368949.9130.python-list at python.org
    Google may not save the attachment, but pipermail does.
        http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/2002-June/107625.html

    Skip Montanaro wants help making Python better at detecting where
    various pieces of BSD DB are installed, and also wants to know if
    it's OK to stop supporting obsolete versions of BSD DB.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=mailman.1023479590.27892.python-list%40python.org

    IDE Studio, an enhanced version of IDLE, including features like a
    graphical class browser, pydoc integration, and method syntax
    tips, released version 1.6.
        http://starship.python.net/crew/mike/Tide/idledev/IDEStudio.html

Discussion on Features of Python:

    Andrew Kuchling has written "What's new in Python 2.3?"
        http://www.python.org/dev/doc/devel/whatsnew/

    eval and exec still need real dicts for variable lookup, which is
    a wart.  This is not a new topic.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=mailman.1023324129.19618.python-list%40python.org
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=mailman.1023322808.24525.python-list%40python.org
        http://groups.google.com/groups?th=2338421ec8397bec&seekm=mailman.1004338951.27778.python-list%40python.org

    The timbot described the implementation details of the built-in
    list type, how it struck a balance between efficient reallocation
    behavior and efficient space usage, and why simple benchmarks may
    not always reveal the whole truth.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=mailman.1023657975.22641.python-list%40python.org

Problems and Solutions:

    There's a new Python Cookbook recipe describing how to produce
    lazily-computed attributes in Python 2.2.
        http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/131495

    David Mertz wrote an article about how to use generators to get
    cooperative multithreading.  It turns out that "yield" really does
    mean "yield" after all.
        http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/library/l-pythrd.html

    Vojin Jovanovic is building a system for describing systems of
    interdependent lazily computed nonscalar values in Python, and
    he's annoyed that his variable names all have to begin with
    "self.".  This is a little different from the standard "Python is
    different from C++ and therefore bad" thread.  Holger Krekel,
    among others, suggested a solution, but it was not sufficient.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=mailman.1023224648.434.python-list%40python.org

    Thomas Heller posted a sort of emulation of classmethod that works
    in Python 2.1.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=ado5v8$uih9$1%40ID-59885.news.dfncis.de

    Uwe Schmitt wanted help talking to his barcode printer directly on
    Microsoft Windows.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=Xns9226F1A931224cliechtigmxnet%4062.2.16.82

    Cimarron Taylor posted his procedure for building a Python
    interpreter with Tkinter and Pmw.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=29e28c51.0206090021.72466d4b%40posting.google.com

Miscellaneous:

    ONLamp.com interviewed Guido van Rossum about Python.
        http://www.onlamp.com/pub/a/python/2002/06/04/guido.html

    EuroPython has posted some more interviews, including one with
    Steve Alexander and Stephan Richter, in which they talk about
    Zope's place in the world and Zope 3.
        http://europython.zope.nl/interviews/entries/steve_stephan_zope

    ActiveState continues its annual sponsorship of Active Awards
    for toilers in the vineyards of its supported languages.  Voting
    closes on the 26th of this month.
	http://www.activestate.com/Corporate/Communications/Releases/Press1023137709.html

    Domenic Merenda, who used to work at BeOpen, is running a
    home-grown ERP system written entirely in Python on an AS/400 to
    manage the operations of a hundred-million-dollar manufacturing
    company.  He hopes to release it as open source. He's looking for
    other people who have done this.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=KHkL8.21383$eD2.2399923271%40newssvr10.news.prodigy.com

    The discussion about ERP systems generalized to large Python
    projects --- more than a few tens of thousands of lines.  Michael
    Chermside posted a summary of a few such systems.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=mailman.1023460091.14067.python-list%40python.org

    Domenic Merenda posted a list of several dozen large Python
    projects that BeOpen had compiled in 2000.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=QX8M8.21882$EP.2548532334%40newssvr10.news.prodigy.com

    Tim Churches answered a question about how to compute confidence
    intervals in Python with an overview of available statistical
    software for Python, including SciPy, RPy, Gary Strangman's stats
    module, and NumPy's MLab.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=mailman.1023574153.24062.python-list%40python.org

    Chris Armstrong is developing a Python-source serialization module
    for arbitrary object instances that works along the same lines as
    pickle, but is human-readable and human-editable.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=mailman.1023668414.25769.python-list%40python.org

    Dean Goodmanson described what features of Python he avoided when
    trying to write Python that would be easy to translate into C++.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=e81be8b2.0206022315.3a0bf9a9%40posting.google.com

    Peter Hansen eloquently praised test-first development.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=3D02FB3B.CF75E925%40engcorp.com

    Dave Cole wrote about why he wrote Albatross, a web application
    framework for Python, when there were already so many web
    application frameworks for Python.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=mailman.1023539113.15573.python-list%40python.org


========================================================================

Everything you want is probably one or two clicks away in these pages:

    Python.org's Python Language Website is the traditional
    center of Pythonia
        http://www.python.org
    Notice especially the master FAQ
        http://www.python.org/doc/FAQ.html

    PythonWare complements the digest you're reading with the
    daily python url
         http://www.pythonware.com/daily  
    Mygale is a news-gathering webcrawler that specializes in (new)
    World-Wide Web articles related to Python.
	 http://www.awaretek.com/nowak/mygale.html 
    While cosmetically similar, Mygale and the Daily Python-URL
    are utterly different in their technologies and generally in
    their results.

    comp.lang.python.announce announces new Python software.  Be
    sure to scan this newly-revitalized newsgroup at least weekly.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?oi=djq&as_ugroup=comp.lang.python.announce

    Michael Hudson continued Andrew Kuchling's marvelous tradition
    of summarizing action on the python-dev mailing list once every
    other week, into July 2001.  Any volunteers to re-start this
    valuable series?
        http://starship.python.net/crew/mwh/summaries/
        http://www.amk.ca/python/dev

    The Vaults of Parnassus ambitiously collect Python resources
        http://www.vex.net/~x/parnassus/   

    Much of Python's real work takes place on Special-Interest Group
    mailing lists
        http://www.python.org/sigs/

    The Python Software Foundation has replaced the Python Consortium
    as an independent nexus of activity
        http://www.python.org/psf/

    Cetus does much of the same
	http://www.cetus-links.org/oo_python.html

    Python FAQTS
        http://python.faqts.com/

    The old Python "To-Do List" now lives principally in a
    SourceForge reincarnation.
	http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?atid=355470&group_id=5470&func=browse
	http://python.sourceforge.net/peps/pep-0042.html
     
    The online Python Journal is posted at pythonjournal.cognizor.com.
    editor at pythonjournal.com and editor at pythonjournal.cognizor.com
    welcome submission of material that helps people's understanding
    of Python use, and offer Web presentation of your work.

    *Py: the Journal of the Python Language*
        http://www.pyzine.com

    Links2Go is a new semi-automated link collection; it's impressive
    what AI can generate
        http://www.links2go.com/search?search=python

    Tenth International Python Conference 
        http://www.python10.org            

    Archive probing tricks of the trade:
        http://groups.google.com/groups?oi=djq&as_ugroup=comp.lang.python&num=100
        http://groups.google.com/groups?meta=site%3Dgroups%26group%3Dcomp.lang.python.*

Previous - (U)se the (R)esource, (L)uke! - messages are listed here:
  http://www.ddj.com/topics/pythonurl/         
  http://purl.org/thecliff/python/url.html (dormant)
or
  http://groups.google.com/groups?oi=djq&as_q=+Python-URL!&as_ugroup=comp.lang.python


Suggestions/corrections for next week's posting are always welcome.
[http://www.egroups.com/list/python-url-leads/ is hibernating.  Just
e-mail us ideas directly.]

To receive a new issue of this posting in e-mail each Monday morning
(approximately), ask <claird at neosoft.com> to subscribe.  Mention
"Python-URL!".


-- The Python-URL! Team--

Dr. Dobb's Journal (http://www.ddj.com) is pleased to participate in and
sponsor the "Python-URL!" project.
-- 

Cameron Laird <Cameron at Lairds.com>
Business:  http://www.Phaseit.net
Personal:  http://starbase.neosoft.com/~claird/home.html



More information about the Python-list mailing list