[Tutor] What is a Python "project"?

[Kent Johnson]

Dick Moores wrote:
> I tried out Wing IDE Personal 
> (<http://wingware.com/wingide-personal>) off and on for 30 days, and 
> then, finding it easy to use (probably because it's designed for 
> Python), decided to buy it. I'm happy with it, and very pleased with 
> the fast response from technical support available by email.
> 
> I've never written anything in Python other than single-file scripts. 
> WingIDE has the ability to handle "projects", which apparently 
> consist of files and "packages". But what is a project? What does a 
> project have that can't be put into a single .py file script?

When a program gets big enough, it is awkward to put everything into a 
single .py file. Breaking the program up into modules or packages makes 
it easier to understand, navigate and test the code. You might have test 
code in a separate module from the code being tested and utility scripts 
that are not part of the main program. You could have a command-line 
front end and a GUI front end. Also you might have non-Python files in 
the project such as configuration files, templates, localization 
resources, build scripts, files needed by tests...

Kent