[Tutor] Intro

[Lisi]

Is it just me, or is this a blatant plug for a specific book, and is it 
therefore Spam?

For what it is worth, I hate all those games.  Alan seems to use address books 
(anyhow initially).  Now I can see the point in that.

Lisi

On Monday 29 August 2011 16:26:55 Cranky Frankie wrote:
> Hi Python tutor listers, as an intro I'll repost what I sent to my
> Linux groups, since one of their members turned me on to you:
>
>
>
> Before Borders imploded I'd joined their club so they'd send me 50%
> coupons now and then. One afternoon last year I was in the store
> browsing the computer books and this Python book caught my eye. I knew
> very little about Python but I knew it had a good rep and I love Monty
> Python so I bought the book then put in on the shelf. Only recently
> did I get around to reading it and I only wish I'd done so sooner,
> it's that good.
>
> The book is "Python Programming for the Absolute Beginner, Third
> Edition" by Michael Dawson, Course Technology, ISBN-13
> 978-1-4354-5500-9, published in 2010. He presumes you know nothing
> about programming and then uses simple computer games to demonstrate
> the power of Python. He starts with those text based games many of us
> used to play, finishing off with GUI based games with music and
> animation, and all the code is downloadable from the publisher's web
> site. That's pretty good for a beginner book, I'd say.
>
> Python itself is a beautiful language. Because it uses indenting for
> constructing programming blocks, not semi-colons or braces, the code
> is inherently clean and crisp. More about Python:
>
> - it's easy to learn yet very powerful
> - very concise and tight syntax
> - comes with it's own IDE
> - no compiling yet can create stand alone apps
> - can be used for scripting or full blown applications
> - runs on all the major OSs
> - no variably type declarations, it can infer them
> - lots of modules (pre-coded specific code routines) available
> - can get productive quickly
> - can code in a procedural or object-oriented style
>
> Here's the typical introductory "Hello World" program:
>
> print("Hello World")
>
> Doesn't get much simpler than that!
>
> He even gets into GUI programming, event driven design, sprites, etc.
> For a book for a supposed absolute beginner I think that's amazing,
> because I can see someone getting this even if they really have no
> coding background. That's how clearly it's written and how clean and
> clear the example code is.
>
> One more side benefit of this book: it contains the gentlest, easiest
> to digest introduction to object-oriented programming I've ever seen,
> and I read a lot of computer stuff. If you're an old-timer like me who
> only studied procedural languages, this is about as easy an
> introduction to the power and flexibility of O-O programming that you
> will ever find.
>
> What I've been wanting to do for a long time is write an app that,
> when my computer starts, displays a window with a quote of the day.
> With this book I now have several ways to take my huge collected
> quotes file, import it into arrays in a Python program, apply a random
> function, and display a random quote each time I log on. That kind of
> app is a natural for Python, but don't kid yourself - he actually
> writes a space invaders type game using some game modules - and this
> in a beginner book! Amazing.
>
>
> This is a great book about a great language.