[Tutor] G'day

[Kent Johnson]

Michael Lange wrote:
> On Wed, 15 Feb 2006 22:05:39 +1100
> "John Connors" <oztriking at hotmail.com> wrote:
> I have a copy of Teach Yourself Python in 24 Hours,
printed in 2000 so I guess it's virtually usless but i was hoping to
learn some of the basics from it.
> 
> I don't think the book is completely useless, it just misses the features added to python since 1.5.2;

Python 1.5.2 is getting pretty long in the tooth. The Python developers 
are very good at maintaining backward compatibility, so most of what you 
learn will be correct and work, but some of it will no longer be 
idiomatic usage and you will not learn about the many new features that 
have been introduced in subsequent versions.

At the very least you should skim the "What's New with Python 2.x" 
documents to get an idea what you are missing. Older versions of this 
document can be found here:
http://www.amk.ca/python/

The Python 2.4 version comes with the Python docs.

You might also want to look at an on-line tutorial to get some more 
modern usage. Several are listed here:
http://wiki.python.org/moin/BeginnersGuide/NonProgrammers

Both Learning to Program and A Byte of Python are popular with beginners.

Kent