Dr. Dobb's Python-URL! - weekly Python news and links (Aug 17)

[Irmen de Jong]

QOTW:  "The best use for a bug report on comp.lang.python is as an object
lesson for your grandchildren:  40 years from now you can search the archives
for it, and tell the little darlings 'see?  if I had only put that on
SourceForge instead, the bug would have been fixed by now'." -- Tim Peters

[on the subject of a tree datastructure that consisting of dicts]
"I thought we made dictionaries out of trees...  Are you trying to reverse
entropy? " -- Bob Gailer


Discussion
----------
It was an entertaining week on comp.lang.python. Have a look at these links:
     Graham Fawcett is one of the people proposing nice new Python slogans.
         <http://groups.google.com/groups?threadm=mailman.1060835422.10350.python-list@python.org>

     Michael Sparks has ideas about what we should do to 'displace java',
     which somehow also involves SCO ;-)
         <http://groups.google.com/groups?threadm=mailman.1060686020.21539.python-list@python.org>

     Theodor Rash has a warning for us in a discussion about Python vs. C#.
     Some people may agree that it is appropriate, others may find that
     a few interesting points are actually being discussed...
         <http://groups.google.com/groups?threadm=54nm01-tqj.ln1@newsgate.kjn.lan>

Thankfully, serious discussion took place as well ;-)
     Is the tilde operator ~ acting weird as a bitwise not operation?
     Tim Peters explains that it doesn't.
         <http://groups.google.com/groups?threadm=mailman.1061098645.13097.python-list@python.org>
     Related to this, an old (but handy) function to print numbers in binary:
         <http://groups.google.com/groups?threadm=slrn9fl4ma.gm8.gaul@meatring.cs.utexas.edu>

     The age-old 8-queen-problem sticks up its head again. Bengt Richter
     is on the loose with several interesting variatons.
         <http://groups.google.com/groups?threadm=bhjg05$88v$0@216.39.172.122>

     For those that have some free time left this summer, Raymond Hettinger
     suggests some interesting reading material, somewhere in Python's
     standard library source code.
         <http://groups.google.com/groups?threadm=5d0_a.288$jw4.85@nwrdny03.gnilink.net>

     Alex Martelli provides the 'real' powerset function. Interesting
     thread about the new sets module by the way.
         <http://groups.google.com/groups?threadm=bhntvc01enr@enews1.newsguy.com>

     Gerhard Haering shows that it is very easy to run Python off a Windows
     network share, instead of a local directory on your own harddisk.
         <http://groups.google.com/groups?threadm=mailman.1060677681.10554.python-list@python.org>

     Andrew Dalke and Aahz take __call__ apart. Calling stuff in Python is
     rather complicated under the hood, it seems... or isn't it?
         <http://groups.google.com/groups?threadm=bhlrgb$q0i$1@slb2.atl.mindspring.net>

Releases
--------
     Pyro 3.3, an advanced and powerful Distributed Object Technology system
     written entirely in Python, and designed to be very easy to use.
         <http://pyro.sourceforge.net/>

     ClientCookie 0.4.4a and ClientForm 0.1.7b, modules for handling
     cookies and HTML forms on the client side (useful for simulating
     a browser).
         <http://wwwsearch.sourceforge.net/>

     dnspython 1.1.0, a DNS toolkit.
         <http://www.dnspython.org/>

     eGenix mx packages: mx BASE 2.0.5 (various utilities including
     mxDateTime), mx Experimental 0.8.0 (experimental tools),
     mxODBC 2.0.6 (ODBC connectivity).
         <http://www.egenix.com/files/python/>

     yawPyCrypto 0.1.1, a facade for the PyCrypto library.
     Flatten 0.2, a serialization library with a secure pickling algorithm,
     especially well suited for network transport of data.
         <http://yawpycrypto.sourceforge.net>

     KirbyBase 1.3, a simple, pure-python, flat-file database mgmt system.
         <http://www.netpromi.com/kirbybase.html>

     SCons 0.91 beta, a software construction tool (build tool, or make tool)
     written in Python.
         <http://www.scons.org/>

     PyTables 0.7.1, a hierarchical database package to organize and
     manipulate scientific data tables as well as Numeric and numarray
     data objects that reside on disk.
         <http://pytables.sourceforge.net/>

     Retic 0.1, an EAI Server written in Python. It permits to build adaptors
     (data flows) with three types of components : sources, pipes and sinks.
         <http://retic.sourceforge.net/>


========================================================================
Everything Python-related 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

    Brett Cannon continues the marvelous tradition established by 
    Andrew Kuchling and Michael Hudson of summarizing action on the
    python-dev mailing list once every other week.
	http://www.python.org/dev/summary/

    The Python Package Index catalogues packages.
        http://www.python.org/pypi/

    The somewhat older Vaults of Parnassus ambitiously collects references
    to all sorts of 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 Business Forum "further[s] the interests of companies
    that base their business on ... Python."
	http://www.python-in-business.org

    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

    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


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