[Tutor] Starting a simple python project

[Mitya Sirenef]

On 03/22/2013 05:02 AM, miguel.guasch at hushmail.com wrote:
> Greetings all!
 >
 >
 > My name is Miguel Guasch, I'm a software tester who's trying to
 > slowly get into automation, and eventually (in a couple of years)
 > into development. For that, I need to learn. At the moment I'm
 > studying computer engineering in the evenings, and we do a lot of
 > work in C and assembly. Java will be coming at some time, but not
 > for the moment. So I decided to learn python as a side project, so
 > I could get my feet wet with OOP and start actually being
 > productive. I understand the basics of OOP thanks to a class I took
 > about object modelling and design (UML on Enterprise Architect)
 >
 > In order to better learn python, I'm trying to "automate" (or make
 > it easier to do) repetitive tasks here in the company.
 >
 > Like, for example:
 >
 > We have to write a daily "status" e-mail of our tasks, divided
 > into: planned for tomorrow, open tasks, finished tasks, general
 > findings.
 >
 > I thought I could take it upon me to write a small program to,
 > instead of writing these e-mails at the end of the day, we could
 > just have the program open, and, as soon as we start working on a
 > task, we enter it, and before we close it, we can write "general
 > findings" to it.
 >
 > It would work like this in the beginning: Open the program, import
 > a new template, write the open tasks you have (and any you receive
 > during the day), and then start working on a certain task. While
 > working on the task, you can write a "general findings" entry to
 > it, and when you're done, you "close it" (meaning, you open the
 > next one). The tasks have specific ID numbers based on our
 > ClearQuest entry numbers, so it would be easy to match the open and
 > finished tasks, and substact the finished from the done ones.
 >
 > At the end of the day, you can click on "end" and it would generate
 > a simple text file with a very simple formatting, like:
 >
 > Planned for tomorrow:
 > 1.
 > 2..
 >
 > And the same with the others.
 >
 > We could then just copy the text files contents and paste them into
 > a regular outlook e-mail
 >
 > This is a simple start, but in the future I'd like to be able to
 > store these tasks in a folder and name the text files with the days
 > date, so I can "import" them back in case I need to look at it.
 > I'd also like to make a small dictionary with the names and e-mail
 > addresses of the people who should receive the e-mail, and somehow
 > either copy the text into an outlook e-mail, or directly send it
 > over SMTP (whichever is simpler)
 >
 >
 > I'm having a hard time actually starting, but so far I have a basic
 > idea and it shouldn't be too hard.
 >
 > I'm planning to use wxPython on Windows 7 because it looks pretty
 > simple so far and it also looks elegant enough :-)
 >
 >
 > If you guys/gals could comment on this, or give me some kind of
 > advice, I'd be more than thankful. I'll be sure to let you know how
 > it goes, and share the source.
 >
 >
 > Thanks, everyone!
 >
 > All the best!
 >
 > Miguel A. Guasch
 > miguel.guasch at hushmail.com
 >
 >

It might be a good idea to first implement this as a command-line script
and then consider moving to a gui; note that Tkinter is quite a bit
easier than wxPython. (and in recent years it was updated to look nicer
than it used to).

  -m


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