Dr. Dobb's Python-URL! - weekly Python news and links (Sep 8)

Tue Sep 9 00:11:29 EDT 2003

QOTW:  "Using os._exit(), on the other hand is like pulling the ejector
seat to land a plane. There's no clean-up, you just get out as fast as
possible."  -- Alan Gould commenting on alternatives to sys.exit().

"I think it's a real and fairly unique selling point for Python that it's
both easy to use and suitable for very varying and advanced applications."  
-- Magnus Lycka

Discussion
----------
    Skip Montanaro briefly states why a user could not find a static
    Python source code analysis tool for revealing caller/callee relationships:
        <http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=mailman.1062967091.26128.python-list@python.org>

    Martin von Loewis explains why Python sequences accept negative indices:
        <http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=m33cf82zas.fsf@mira.informatik.hu-berlin.de>

    Miki Tebeka posts an introductory Python slideshow that incorporates
    feedback from reviewers on comp.lang.python:
        <http://www.cs.bgu.ac.il/~tebeka/Geek/pyintro.pdf>

    David Mertz gathers feedback for an upcoming article on the best Python
    IDEs.  The resulting thread is highly informative about the strengths and
    weaknesses of various products:
        <http://groups.google.com/groups?th=2c8bef8df221f515>

    Martin von Loewis briefly demonstrates how to create an object that
    compares larger than all other objects:
        <http://groups.google.com/groups?f&selm=bj84rl%24j2c%2407%244@news.t-online.com>

    Cameron Laird explains how to implement drag-and-drop in Tkinter:
        <http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=vle0j01npmca27@corp.supernews.com>

    Stefan Fleiter noticed an anomaly in the implementation of slice.__hash__()
    The important part of the thread is that after confirming that this was not
    desired behavior, he posted a bug report, and it was promptly fixed.  
        <http://groups.google.com/groups?th=58171dab2279a6c6>

    Howard Lightstone asks for and gets advice an how to internationalize an
    existing python application:
        <http://groups.google.com/groups?th=34ed230b16a28e01>

    Does Python 2.3 matter?  Yes.
	http://www.byte.com/documents/byt1062182129207/

    Skip Montanaro setup a wiki so that the community can participate in
    creating a glossary of key python terminology.
        <http://manatee.mojam.com/python-glossary>

    This week's ideas for changing the language:
        * make the "self" method argument implicit

Releases
--------
    PyRSS2Gen - RSS 2.0 generator for Python
        <http://www.dalkescientific.com/Python/PyRSS2Gen.html>

    Naja 0.8.5 - download manager and a website grabber
        <http://www.keyphrene.com/products/naja>

    BTManager 1.0.7 - a BitTorrent download manager and client, written in pure
        Python and based on the current BitTorrent official implementation.
        <http://www.sourceforge.net/projects/btmanager/>

    dnspython 1.2.0b1 - a DNS toolkit for Python. It supports almost all record
        types and can be used for queries, zone transfers, and dynamic
        updates.  It supports TSIG authenticated messages and EDNS0.
        <http://www.dnspython.org/>

    pygantt-0.9.2 - tool tranforming XML project task descriptions into
        Gantt charts.
        <http://www.logilab.org/projects/pygantt>

    HarvestMan 1.2alpha - a full-featured, multithreaded, multiprotocol,
        customizable web crawler written in python.
        <http://sithara.freezope.org/harvestman/source>

    MojoView 1.0 - Python package for building simple gui database applications
        using PyGTK2.
        <http://www.netpromi.com/files/MojoView-1.0.zip>

========================================================================
Everything Python-related you want is probably one or two clicks away in
these pages:

    Python.org's Python Language Website is the traditional
    center of Pythonia
        http://www.python.org
    Notice especially the master FAQ
        http://www.python.org/doc/FAQ.html

    PythonWare complements the digest you're reading with the
    daily python url
         http://www.pythonware.com/daily  
    Mygale is a news-gathering webcrawler that specializes in (new)
    World-Wide Web articles related to Python.
         http://www.awaretek.com/nowak/mygale.html 
    While cosmetically similar, Mygale and the Daily Python-URL
    are utterly different in their technologies and generally in
    their results.

    comp.lang.python.announce announces new Python software.  Be
    sure to scan this newly-revitalized newsgroup at least weekly.
        http://groups.google.com/groups?oi=djq&as_ugroup=comp.lang.python.announce

    Brett Cannon continues the marvelous tradition established by 
    Andrew Kuchling and Michael Hudson of summarizing action on the
    python-dev mailing list once every other week.
	http://www.python.org/dev/summary/

    The Python Package Index catalogues packages.
        http://www.python.org/pypi/

    The somewhat older Vaults of Parnassus ambitiously collects references
    to all sorts of Python resources.
        http://www.vex.net/~x/parnassus/   

    Much of Python's real work takes place on Special-Interest Group
    mailing lists
        http://www.python.org/sigs/

    The Python Business Forum "further[s] the interests of companies
    that base their business on ... Python."
	http://www.python-in-business.org

    The Python Software Foundation has replaced the Python Consortium
    as an independent nexus of activity
        http://www.python.org/psf/

    Cetus does much of the same
        http://www.cetus-links.org/oo_python.html

    Python FAQTS
        http://python.faqts.com/

    The old Python "To-Do List" now lives principally in a
    SourceForge reincarnation.
        http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?atid=355470&group_id=5470&func=browse
        http://python.sourceforge.net/peps/pep-0042.html

    The online Python Journal is posted at pythonjournal.cognizor.com.
    editor at pythonjournal.com and editor at pythonjournal.cognizor.com
    welcome submission of material that helps people's understanding
    of Python use, and offer Web presentation of your work.

    *Py: the Journal of the Python Language*
        http://www.pyzine.com

    Archive probing tricks of the trade:
        http://groups.google.com/groups?oi=djq&as_ugroup=comp.lang.python&num=100
        http://groups.google.com/groups?meta=site%3Dgroups%26group%3Dcomp.lang.python.*

Previous - (U)se the (R)esource, (L)uke! - messages are listed here:
  http://www.ddj.com/topics/pythonurl/         
  http://purl.org/thecliff/python/url.html (dormant)
or
  http://groups.google.com/groups?oi=djq&as_q=+Python-URL!&as_ugroup=comp.lang.python

Suggestions/corrections for next week's posting are always welcome.
E-mail to <Python-URL at phaseit.net> should get through.

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-- The Python-URL! Team--

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