Recurring Talk: Programmer's Corner

A focus on the 'art of programming' and away from 'module of the week'. The idea is to focus less on particular syntax and talk about when you'd use certain programming concepts and their strengths/weaknesses. Some possible topics, in no particular order are:

Exceptions
- What are they, really?
- Where can you find the list of existing exceptions?
- How do you create your own exception? When should you do so?
- Things to know about catching, raising and reraising exceptions.
What is a list comprehension? A generator expression? How are they different and how do you choose?
When breaking down elements, when do you use inheritance, composition and mix-ins?
How do you create a thread? Give it work? Wait for it to finish?
What is string interpolation? What are the various alternative ways? What's this new module string.Template?
Architectual underpinnings of dicts, lists, tuples, strings and arrays; what are their performance and memory tradeoffs?
All about subscripting
- from, to step
- mutable versus immutable types
- what the heck is the ellipsis type?
A discussion about parsing text with the standard library, the various options and tradeoffs.
So you want to support plugins in your shiny new application; what are your choices? Twisted, Zope, Eggs, etc.?
Tell me again how a decorator works? When do you use it? When do you NOT use it?
What the heck is a function signature? How do I read it? What does it have to do with decorators?
How many bytecodes does it take to implement my new class? How do I dump the underlying bytecode for my class?
How to implement various B-tree and hash data structures in Python? Persistently?
Docstrings seem easy; now what do I put in them? What markups exist? What tools to extract them?
Let's review mutability versus immutability; the id() function, and the 'is' expression. How do I choose between a tuple, a list and an array?
I keep hearing about 'continuations' but don't really get them.
I keep hearing about 'closures' but get them confused with continuations; what are they again?
Testing is important; what are the various kinds (unit, mock, functional, system) and how does Python help?
What exactly is object-oriented programming? We hear the word so often, but it's often hard to explain.
People talk about 'elegant programming' or that algorithm is rather 'elegant'; what are they talking about?
What is a DSL (domain specific language), when are they useful and how does Python support them?
How can I navigate a huge body of source code: ctags, pydocs, editor support, etc.
I hear about aspect-oriented programming; how do you do that in Python and why would you want to?
"Debugging Strategies: logging, single-stepping, stress testing, random bug hunts"
How do I report a bug? To whom, what information do I provide and how do I prepare a patch?
How do I become a great programmer? A really great one?
I've inherited a program; how do you effectively read someone else's code and make sense of it?
Dicts and Sets: The Lesser Known Methods
Metaclasses; show me how to create a registry of all instances of a class (and subclasses).
Metaclasses; show me how to construct a bridge class on the fly from a database schema.
The secrets of weakrefs; what are they and when would they be useful?

Recurring Talk: A Source Walkthru

For each meeting, an interesting source module or two are selected in advance and as a group we walk through it and discuss how it works and what advanced concepts it brings.

Topics

WSGI - Jeff
Nokia Phone - Martin
Nokia Pad - Martin
wxWidgets - Brad
Eggs (repeat) - Jeff
Twisted (repeat) - Jeff
DBAPI/SQL Lite
Python Library
Stackless
PyPy ?
Numeric?
SciPy ??
PyMedia ??
Py2EXE ?
Gnome Applets
DBUS
Python Extension/Embedding

Theme: Formatting Data

Theme: Databases

Intro to DB-API 2.0
SQL-Lite
ORMs ?: SQLAlchemy ? versus SQLObject ? versus Dabo's ORM

Theme: UIs ?

wxWidgets
Gnome Applets
Python Card

Theme: Command-Line Processing

sys.argv
optparse
getopt

Theme: Distribution

py2exe
py2app
droplets
Gnome Applets
DBUS

Theme: Apps w/Embedded Python

Bacula
OpenOffice ?
AppScript ?
Vim
Blender
Postgres Stored Procedures
SVN
Faces
SVG

12 User(s) Active on Site 232 Wiki Pages Most Recently Modified WebFrameworks.RecentChanges Main.LocalEmployers Main.AboutPython Main.PythonProjects Dallas.Sat19Apr2008 Dallas.Sat26Apr2008 Main.HomePage Main.SearchWiki Dallas.Sat12Apr2008 Meeting Schedules Dallas Meeting Schedule Ft. Worth Meeting Schedule Club Resources (edit) Our Mailing Lists Our Source Repository Proposed Meeting Topics Presentations Our Install HOW-TOs Our Projects Member Profiles ? Local Employers About the Python Language About Web Frameworks Python Reading Materials Bookmark URL Sharing How This Wiki Works Tips For Editing ? Documentation Index TextFormattingRules MarkupMasterIndex Contact: jeff at taupro.com Meeting space complements of: Check them out; they are a great source of technical books at very good prices! If you have shopped at Nerdbooks.com, help them out by reviewing them at ResellerRatings.com. You will need your invoice number to prove you are a real customer, and not just ballot stuffing.
	Top . Main . TalkIdeas	Recent Changes Printable View Page History Edit Page
	Content Last Modified on January 25, 2008, at 09:06 AM CST Recurring Talk: Programmer's Corner A focus on the 'art of programming' and away from 'module of the week'. The idea is to focus less on particular syntax and talk about when you'd use certain programming concepts and their strengths/weaknesses. Some possible topics, in no particular order are: Exceptions What are they, really? Where can you find the list of existing exceptions? How do you create your own exception? When should you do so? Things to know about catching, raising and reraising exceptions. What is a list comprehension? A generator expression? How are they different and how do you choose? When breaking down elements, when do you use inheritance, composition and mix-ins? How do you create a thread? Give it work? Wait for it to finish? What is string interpolation? What are the various alternative ways? What's this new module string.Template? Architectual underpinnings of dicts, lists, tuples, strings and arrays; what are their performance and memory tradeoffs? All about subscripting from, to step mutable versus immutable types what the heck is the ellipsis type? A discussion about parsing text with the standard library, the various options and tradeoffs. So you want to support plugins in your shiny new application; what are your choices? Twisted, Zope, Eggs, etc.? Tell me again how a decorator works? When do you use it? When do you NOT use it? What the heck is a function signature? How do I read it? What does it have to do with decorators? How many bytecodes does it take to implement my new class? How do I dump the underlying bytecode for my class? How to implement various B-tree and hash data structures in Python? Persistently? Docstrings seem easy; now what do I put in them? What markups exist? What tools to extract them? Let's review mutability versus immutability; the id() function, and the 'is' expression. How do I choose between a tuple, a list and an array? I keep hearing about 'continuations' but don't really get them. I keep hearing about 'closures' but get them confused with continuations; what are they again? Testing is important; what are the various kinds (unit, mock, functional, system) and how does Python help? What exactly is object-oriented programming? We hear the word so often, but it's often hard to explain. People talk about 'elegant programming' or that algorithm is rather 'elegant'; what are they talking about? What is a DSL (domain specific language), when are they useful and how does Python support them? How can I navigate a huge body of source code: ctags, pydocs, editor support, etc. I hear about aspect-oriented programming; how do you do that in Python and why would you want to? "Debugging Strategies: logging, single-stepping, stress testing, random bug hunts" How do I report a bug? To whom, what information do I provide and how do I prepare a patch? How do I become a great programmer? A really great one? I've inherited a program; how do you effectively read someone else's code and make sense of it? Dicts and Sets: The Lesser Known Methods Metaclasses; show me how to create a registry of all instances of a class (and subclasses). Metaclasses; show me how to construct a bridge class on the fly from a database schema. The secrets of weakrefs; what are they and when would they be useful? Recurring Talk: A Source Walkthru For each meeting, an interesting source module or two are selected in advance and as a group we walk through it and discuss how it works and what advanced concepts it brings. Topics WSGI - Jeff Nokia Phone - Martin Nokia Pad - Martin wxWidgets - Brad Eggs (repeat) - Jeff Twisted (repeat) - Jeff DBAPI/SQL Lite Python Library Stackless PyPy ? Numeric? SciPy ?? PyMedia ?? Py2EXE ? Gnome Applets DBUS Python Extension/Embedding Theme: Formatting Data ReportLab ? PyChart ? Pango Blender OpenOffice ? Theme: Databases Intro to DB-API 2.0 SQL-Lite ORMs ?: SQLAlchemy ? versus SQLObject ? versus Dabo's ORM Theme: UIs ? wxWidgets Gnome Applets Python Card Theme: Command-Line Processing sys.argv optparse getopt Theme: Distribution py2exe py2app droplets Gnome Applets DBUS Theme: Apps w/Embedded Python Bacula OpenOffice ? AppScript ? Vim Blender Postgres Stored Procedures SVN Faces SVG
WikiHelp \| SearchWiki	Recent Changes Printable View Page History Edit Page

Most Recently Modified

Meeting Schedules

Club Resources (edit)

How This Wiki Works