Mailman 3 December 1999 - Python-announce-list

Zope Weekly News - Wed, 22 Dec 1999
by Mike Pelletier Dec. 23, 1999

Dec. 23, 1999

G'day, Zope Weekly News is a digest of some of the useful and interesting events which have occurred on the various Zope mailing lists and the Zope.org site. It is published each Wednesday evening. Any opinions contained in the Zope Weekly News are those of the chronicler exclusively. Announcements * Amos Lattier has started a series at XML.com about XML and Zope. The first article is available. http://www.xml.com/pub/1999/12/zope/index.html * Beehive has translated additional Zope How-Tos into German. German speaking Zope users are welcome to contribute to the effort. http://www.zope.de/bibliothek/How-Tos/ http://www.zope.de * The new Zope Front Door has been installed. Comments to webmaster(a)zope.org are encouraged. http://www.zope.org * Lutz Ehrlich <Lutz.Ehrlich(a)EMBL-Heidelberg.de> has launched the German Python/Zope network. "It is meant to be a lightweight and efficient means to form a network of freelancers able to provide Python/Zope services in the German speaking part of the world." http://www.python-netzwerk.de * A mailing list has been set up to support the Zope Mozilla Initiative. It's address is zope-mozilla(a)zope.org. http://www.zope.org/Resources/Mozilla New Products * "4am" posted a bash script to automate generating distribution archives of Python Products. http://www.zope.org/Members/4am/packProduct Updates * The Z SQL Methods User's Guide has been updated. http://www.zope.org/Documentation/Guides/ZSQL * "4am" has updated SiteAccess to work with Zope 2.1. http://www.zope.org/Members/4am/SiteAccess Zope.org items * "limi" posted the 100th How-To, which is about using multiple-selection and selection properties. http://www.zope.org/Members/limi/multipleselection-howto * "dparker" submitted a tip for editing Zope resources with the editor of your choice under KDE, and suggests that the same technique may work for other environments. http://www.zope.org/Members/dparker/alternativeeditors * "sfs" has contributed a helpful document on forcing clients to use HTTPS when using the management interface. http://www.zope.org/Members/sfs/Apache/SSL/forcehttpsformanage Notable Discussions * chas <panda(a)skinnyhippo.com> started a discussion titled "Linux/Redhat advice : RPMs vs Src for Zope development ?" "chas" is new to Linux, coming from a FreeBSD background, and he in curious about the relative merits of installing from the sources versus installing with an RPM. http://lists.zope.org/pipermail/zope/1999-December/016006.html * Christopher Petrilli <petrilli(a)digicool.com> posted to zope-dev to let everyone know that Even Simpson's Python Methods have been rolled in to Zope, and are now committed to the CVS. Some discussion of Python Methods followed. http://lists.zope.org/pipermail/zope-dev/1999-December/002735.html * Dave Parker <dparker(a)globalcrossing.com> complained that his namespace kept disappearing when he called a DTML Method from a DTML Method. Jim Fulton and others wrote in explaining what was happening, why it happened, and how to pass values to a DTML Method without losing your namespace. A lot of very useful information, sure to cause many a forehead-slap. Jim also mentions that you may not have to jump through this particular hoop too much longer. http://lists.zope.org/pipermail/zope-dev/1999-December/002715.html * Andrew Hall <aah(a)impaq.net.au> has his FastCGI/Zope setup troubleshot by the mailing list. An error in the documentation (doc/WEBSERVER.txt) is pointed out! (Corrected in the CVS.) http://lists.zope.org/pipermail/zope/1999-December/015882.html == Mike Pelletier. -- ----------- comp.lang.python.announce (moderated) ---------- Article Submission Address: python-announce(a)python.org Python Language Home Page: http://www.python.org/ Python Quick Help Index: http://www.python.org/Help.html ------------------------------------------------------------

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Two weeks Till Python Conference Early Bird Registration Deadline!
by Guido van Rossum Dec. 23, 1999

Dec. 23, 1999

We know that the Python conference isn't until the next millennium. You have exactly two weeks left to register and qualify for the early bird registration. Since most of that time most people are taking off for the holidays, it's really NOW OR NEVER! If you haven't registered and paid by January 5, you will paying full price... So, be smart and register NOW. Also don't forget to book your hotel room by January 3. Some highlights from the conference program: - 8 tutorials on topics ranging from JPython to Fnorb; - a keynote by Open Source evangelist Eric Raymond; - another by Randy Pausch, father of the Alice Virtual Reality project; - a separate track for Zope developers and users; - live demonstrations of important Python applications; - refereed papers, and short talks on current topics; - a developers' day where the feature set of Python 2.0 is worked out. Our motto, due to Bruce Eckel, is: "Life's better without braces." Come and join us at the Key Bridge Marriott in Rosslyn (across the bridge from Georgetown), January 24-27 in 2000. Make the Python conference the first conference you attend in the new millennium! The early bird registration deadline is January 5. More info: http://www.python.org/workshops/2000-01/ The program is now complete with the titles of all presentations. There is still space in the demo session and in the short talks session. --Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/) -- ----------- comp.lang.python.announce (moderated) ---------- Article Submission Address: python-announce(a)python.org Python Language Home Page: http://www.python.org/ Python Quick Help Index: http://www.python.org/Help.html ------------------------------------------------------------

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Dr. Dobb's Python-URL! - weekly Python news and links (Dec 21)
by Gordon McMillan Dec. 23, 1999

Dec. 23, 1999

People interested in optional static typing in Python should look at the types SIG http://www.python.org/pipermail/types-sig/ which is experiencing a flood of activity, (including unauthorized use of Guido's time-machine). Meanwhile, a minor flood of announcements in Pythondom: Jean-Claude Wippler announces that MetaKit (a fast, lightweight embedded DB library with surprising capabilities) is now Open Source http://www.deja.com/getdoc.xp?AN=561017677 http://www.equi4.com/metakit/ Last week we saw the announcement that DISLIN (a cross platform plotting package) comes with Python bindings; this week Paul Magwene announces a Python OO wrapper library http://www.deja.com/getdoc.xp?AN=560482093 A bug fix release of Zope http://www.deja.com/getdoc.xp?AN=560591351 A new release of PyQt/PyKDE (now compiling on Windows NT) from Phil Thompson http://www.deja.com/getdoc.xp?AN=562647925 A very early (developer only) release of Python Builder (an IDE for the keyboard impared) is now available from Cliff Baeseman http://www.deja.com/getdoc.xp?AN=560830466 William Annis releases a developer-only snapshot of Mom - a Unix system monitoring tool (primary platform: Solaris) http://www.deja.com/getdoc.xp?AN=561060235 John Aycock announces an early version of his Decompyle package (reconstruct source from bytecodes) http://www.deja.com/getdoc.xp?AN=563144526 Two juicy tidbits in the "completely different" category: Looking for something interesting to do with that huge power-sucking box in the basement? IBM has posted instructions on porting Python 1.4 to OS/390 http://www2.s390.ibm.com/products/oe/python.html (If you have a spare, please ship one to Tim, so he can test floating point conformance <wink>.) Those in search of a license model might consider Just van Rossum's unique approach http://www.deja.com/getdoc.xp?AN=562607678 Don't forget that the early-bird prices for the Python conference expire on January 5th http://www.python.org/workshops/2000-01/ ======================================================================== Everything you want is probably one or two clicks away in these pages: Python.org's Python Language Website is the center of Pythonia http://www.python.org Much of Python's real work takes place on Special-Interest Group mailing lists http://www.python.org/sigs/ Python Consortium emerges as an independent nexus of activity http://www.python.org/consortium Python To-Do List anticipates some of Python's future direction http://www.python.org/cgi-bin/todo.py Python Journal is at work on its second issue http://www.pythonjournal.com Links2Go is a new semi-automated link collection; it's impressive what AI can generate http://www.links2go.com/search?search=python Archive probing trick of the trade: http://www.dejanews.com/dnquery.xp?QRY=&DBS=2&ST=PS&defaultOp=AND&LNG=ALL&f… Previous - (U)se the (R)esource, (L)uke! - messages are listed here: http://purl.org/thecliff/python/url.html or http://www.dejanews.com/dnquery.xp?QRY=~g%20comp.lang.python%20Python-URL%21 Suggestions/corrections for next week's posting are always welcome. http://www.egroups.com/list/python-url-leads/ To receive a new issue of this posting in e-mail each Monday morning, ask <claird(a)neosoft.com> to subscribe. Mention "Python-URL!". -- The Python-URL! Team-- Dr. Dobb's Journal (http://www.ddj.com) is pleased to participate in and sponsor the "Python-URL!" project. == Cameron Laird <claird(a)NeoSoft.com> Business: http://www.Phaseit.net Personal: http://starbase.neosoft.com/~claird/home.html -- ----------- comp.lang.python.announce (moderated) ---------- Article Submission Address: python-announce(a)python.org Python Language Home Page: http://www.python.org/ Python Quick Help Index: http://www.python.org/Help.html ------------------------------------------------------------

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MetaKit 2.0 open source embedded database
by Jean-Claude Wippler Dec. 15, 1999

Dec. 15, 1999

This announcement marks the release of MetaKit as open source. MetaKit is an efficient database library with a small footprint. It's a cross between flat-file, relational databases, and OODBMS. Keywords: structured storage, transacted commit, load on-demand, portable, C++, Python, Tcl, scripting, instant schema evolution. RELEASE NOTES: The new release is nearly identical to the recent 1.9 release, with a few minor tweaks, and updated documentation. The change is that source code is now freely available to anyone. License: X/MIT-style open source. Commercial support is provided though an Enterprise License from Equi4 Software, see the website. MetaKit 2.0 embodies the evolution of 3 years of development and production use, and is considered a pretty stable release. Both the Python and the Tcl extension interfaces have been adjusted to use the new 2.0 release number, and are now part of the core. The MetaKit home page is at: http://www.equi4.com/metakit/ with links to documentation, source code, all license details, mailing lists (moved), defect tracking (new), and a CVS repository (new). The new services are hosted on the SourceForge Open Source site. Binary builds of this library are currently available by FTP for: Unix (AIX, Digital Unix, HP-UX, Linux, Solaris), Windows (9X/NT), and Macintosh (PPC). Older release builds are available for VMS, BeOS, SGI, and a few others (all the way down to 16-bit MS-DOS). Both old and new releases remain 100% supported by yours truly. The bug database is there to report problems, and CVS is there to get fixes and patches back out to everyone - so let's use them! As the 2.0 version number indicates, this also marks the start of a new range of MetaKit releases. Having successfully proven the concepts that underpin MetaKit over the last several years, it is time to open up the system to all developers who are interested in simplicity and raw performance. Over the coming months, I'll be making a substantial number of new contributions, while at the same time inviting every interested developer to discuss ideas to make MetaKit even faster, more scalable, multi-user / -threading, and binding it to many more languages and platforms. If there is a need, separate "stable" & "bleeding-edge" areas will be set up. The website, code, and documentation are currently being adjusted to iron out all wrinkles of these changes. Hello, DBMS world :) -- Jean-Claude Wippler <jcw(a)equi4.com> <A HREF="http://www.equi4.com/metakit/">MetaKit 2.0</A> - open-source release of the powerful MetaKit 2.0 database library for flexible structured storage; features Python bindings. (15-Dec-99) -- ----------- comp.lang.python.announce (moderated) ---------- Article Submission Address: python-announce(a)python.org Python Language Home Page: http://www.python.org/ Python Quick Help Index: http://www.python.org/Help.html ------------------------------------------------------------

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Don't forget to register for the Python conference!
by Guido van Rossum Dec. 15, 1999

Dec. 15, 1999

We know that the Python conference isn't until the next millennium. You still have THREE WHOLE WEEKS to register and qualify for the early bird registration. However, at least one of those weeks you will have partying and family gatherings on your mind, and when that week's over, recovery from the partying and gathering will probably take priority over registering for the conference, and as a result you might be PAYING FULL PRICE! (The horror!) That is, if your payment isn't received by January 5, 2000. So, be smart and register *before* Christmas. That's still more than ten days -- plenty of time to make travel arrangements, register for the conference, and present your boss with the bill (in that order). Our motto, due to Bruce Eckel, is: "Life's better without braces." Some highlights from the conference program: - 8 tutorials on topics ranging from JPython to Fnorb; - a keynote by Open Source evangelist Eric Raymond; - another by Randy Pausch, father of the Alice Virtual Reality project; - a separate track for Zope developers and users; - live demonstrations of important Python applications; - refereed papers, and short talks on current topics; - a developers' day where the feature set of Python 2.0 is worked out. Come and join us at the Key Bridge Marriott in Rosslyn (across the bridge from Georgetown), January 24-27 in 2000. Make the Python conference the first conference you attend in the new millennium! The early bird registration deadline is January 5. More info: http://www.python.org/workshops/2000-01/ --Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/) -- ----------- comp.lang.python.announce (moderated) ---------- Article Submission Address: python-announce(a)python.org Python Language Home Page: http://www.python.org/ Python Quick Help Index: http://www.python.org/Help.html ------------------------------------------------------------

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Dr. Dobb's Python-URL! - weekly Python news and links (Dec 14)
by Gordon McMillan Dec. 14, 1999

Dec. 14, 1999

David Beazley announces that bugs found in his "Python Essential Reference" (New Riders) can earn $20 for the PSA: http://www.deja.com/getdoc.xp?AN=557827647 Irmen de Jong announces PYRO version 0.7 - a Python-only distributed object system (reminiscent of Java's RMI): http://www.deja.com/getdoc.xp?AN=558940469 Math freaks may get turned on by Robert Harrison's Python interface to the C Global Arrays library (parallel processing and all that good stuff): http://www.deja.com/getdoc.xp?AN=558940468 Christian Scholz releases version 0.1 of his davserver: http://www.deja.com/getdoc.xp?AN=558937851 Tim Peters posts some code for generating combinations (demonstrating once again that a "simple" problem isn't simple): http://www.deja.com/[ST_rn=ps]/getdoc.xp?AN=558836665 A number of posts seen on the newsgroup and through the mail / news gateway have not appeared on Deja news. Among these was the announcement by Paul Magwene that DISLIN (a multiplatform plotting package) now comes with a Python interface (pxDislin) on certain platforms. See the DISLIN page for more info: http://www.linmpi.mpg.de/dislin/ ======================================================================== Everything you want is probably one or two clicks away in these pages: Python.org's Python Language Website is the center of Pythonia http://www.python.org Much of Python's real work takes place on Special-Interest Group mailing lists http://www.python.org/sigs/ Python Consortium emerges as an independent nexus of activity http://www.python.org/consortium Python To-Do List anticipates some of Python's future direction http://www.python.org/cgi-bin/todo.py Python Journal is at work on its second issue http://www.pythonjournal.com Links2Go is a new semi-automated link collection; it's impressive what AI can generate http://www.links2go.com/search?search=python Archive probing trick of the trade: http://www.dejanews.com/dnquery.xp?QRY=&DBS=2&ST=PS&defaultOp=AND&LNG=ALL&f… Previous - (U)se the (R)esource, (L)uke! - messages are listed here: http://purl.org/thecliff/python/url.html or http://www.dejanews.com/dnquery.xp?QRY=~g%20comp.lang.python%20Python-URL%21 Suggestions/corrections for next week's posting are always welcome. http://www.egroups.com/list/python-url-leads/ To receive a new issue of this posting in e-mail each Monday morning, ask <claird(a)neosoft.com> to subscribe. Mention "Python-URL!". -- The Python-URL! Team-- Dr. Dobb's Journal (http://www.ddj.com) is pleased to participate in and sponsor the "Python-URL!" project. == Cameron Laird <claird(a)NeoSoft.com> Business: http://www.Phaseit.net Personal: http://starbase.neosoft.com/~claird/home.html -- ----------- comp.lang.python.announce (moderated) ---------- Article Submission Address: python-announce(a)python.org Python Language Home Page: http://www.python.org/ Python Quick Help Index: http://www.python.org/Help.html ------------------------------------------------------------

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Zope 2.1.1 has been released
by Brian Lloyd Dec. 14, 1999

Dec. 14, 1999

Hi all, Zope 2.1.1 has been released. This is a bug-fix release that includes fixes for better handling of multiple-write conflicts, undo-related problems and problems that prevented certain third-party Zope products such as Squishdot from working. For more information, see the file CHANGES.txt in the doc directory of the distribution. As always, you can get the 2.1.1 release from Zope.org: http://www.zope.org/Products/Zope/2.1.1/ Brian Lloyd brian(a)digicool.com Software Engineer 540.371.6909 Digital Creations http://www.digicool.com <A HREF="http://www.zope.org/">Zope 2.1.1</A> - a free, open source web application platform used for building high-performance, dynamic web sites; bug-fix update. (14-Dec-99) -- ----------- comp.lang.python.announce (moderated) ---------- Article Submission Address: python-announce(a)python.org Python Language Home Page: http://www.python.org/ Python Quick Help Index: http://www.python.org/Help.html ------------------------------------------------------------

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pxDislin - release 0.1
by Paul M Dec. 14, 1999

Dec. 14, 1999

DESCRIPTION: ----------- pxDislin is an object-oriented wrapper around the DISLIN plotting library. DISLIN is a powerful and flexible multiplatform (Win32, Unix, Linux, etc.) library designed for displaying scientific data. DISLIN's author, Helmut Michels, has made available a DISLIN plotting extension for the Python programming language (see http://www.linmpi.mpg.de/dislin/ for more details). pxDislin provides a set of classes which represent various aspects of DISLIN plots, as well as providing some easy to use classes for creating commonly used plot formats (e.g. scatter plots, histograms, 3-D surface plots). A major goal in designing the library was to facilitate interactive data exploration and plot creation. Documentation and a demo program are included. The library has been tested on WinNT and FreeBSD, but I anticipate that it should work on any platform which can make use of Python, NumPy, and the DISLIN python extensions. Feedback, comments, and critique are gladly accepted (email: paul.magwene(a)yale.edu). VERSION: ------- This is release 0.1 of pxDislin. URL: ---- You can find pxDislin at: http://pantheon.yale.edu/~pmm34/pxdislin.html Paul Magwene paul.magwene(a)yale.edu <A HREF="http://pantheon.yale.edu/~pmm34/pxdislin.html">pxDislin 0.1</A> - a set of object-oriented classes which work with the DISLIN Python extension (for displaying scientific data). (13-Dec-99) -- ----------- comp.lang.python.announce (moderated) ---------- Article Submission Address: python-announce(a)python.org Python Language Home Page: http://www.python.org/ Python Quick Help Index: http://www.python.org/Help.html ------------------------------------------------------------

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web2ldap.py 0.5.3: WWW gateway for accessing LDAP servers
by Michael Ströder Dec. 13, 1999

Dec. 13, 1999

HI! I would like to announce a new version of web2ldap (formerly known as ldap-client-cgi.py), a full-featured LDAPv2 client written in Python designed to run as a CGI-BIN under the control of a WWW server. It's available for free (GPL) from http://sites.inka.de/ms/python/web2ldap/ There's also a working demo there. I would like to encourage people to give feedback about the usability of this program. Ciao, Michael. Changes since 0.5.2: some minor bugfixes: - deal with DNs containing spaces between DN components - fixed behaviour of accidently case sensitive attribute name handling in addform/modifyform <A HREF="http://sites.inka.de/ms/python/web2ldap/">web2ldap.py 0.5.3</A> - LDAP web client; minor bugfix update. (12-Dec-99) -- ----------- comp.lang.python.announce (moderated) ---------- Article Submission Address: python-announce(a)python.org Python Language Home Page: http://www.python.org/ Python Quick Help Index: http://www.python.org/Help.html ------------------------------------------------------------

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Spanish Translation of Python Tutorial
by Marcos Sánchez Provencio Dec. 13, 1999

Dec. 13, 1999

Announcing (again) ---------- Translation of Python Tutorial (GvR) into Spanish Guía de aprendizaje de Python (GvR) traducida al castellano <A HREF="http://www.zope.org/Members/rapto/tut">Guía de aprendizaje de Python 1.5.2</A> - traducida al castellano, en PDF, HTML, PS. (10-Dec-99) -- ----------- comp.lang.python.announce (moderated) ---------- Article Submission Address: python-announce(a)python.org Python Language Home Page: http://www.python.org/ Python Quick Help Index: http://www.python.org/Help.html ------------------------------------------------------------

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