Mailman 3 July 2005 - Python-announce-list

[ANNOUNCE] gmpy 1.0 alpha released
by Alex Martelli Nov. 13, 2005

Nov. 13, 2005

See http://gmpy.sourceforge.net/ for details. What is it: a wrapper for the GMP library, to provide multi-precision arithmetic for Python. Multi-precision floats, and unbounded-precision rationals, are not present in stock Python; multi-precision integers ('long') are, but gmpy's version of multi-precision integers is faster for some operations (NOT all -- used to be, but Python 2.3 did serious enhancements to some operations on longs) and provides lots of nifty pre-packaged additional functions. Minor changes and bug-fixes since the latest 0.9 pre-alpha; support for Python 2.3. The Windows binary release is now for Python 2.3 _only_ (if you're stuck with Python 2.2 on Windows, you can keep using gmpy 0.9 pre-alpha and not really suffer from that). Known bug on Windows: the scan0 and scan1 functions appear broken (perhaps related to the lack of a GMP 4.0 library for Windows -- haven't found one around yet). Alex

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ANN: PyDev 0.9.4 released
by Fabio Zadrozny Sept. 6, 2005

Sept. 6, 2005

Hi All, PyDev - Python IDE (Python Development Enviroment for Eclipse) version 0.9.4 has just been released. Check the homepage (http://pydev.sourceforge.net/) for more details. Release Highlights: - New PYTHONPATH configuration (for the whole ambient), used for running your files, PyLint, code completion... - Integrated Scott Schleiser patches for the debugger (you won't see any 'implement me' anymore!). - Integrated Heikki Toivonen patch for PyLint using the project pythonpath. - Integrated Heikki Toivonen patch for indentation after '(', '[' and '{' (if the line ends with a comma). - Some StackOverflow errors were removed from code completion. - Keybindings added for Refactoring (powered by bycicle repair man) - check the FAQ. - Some bug-fixes as usual... Regards, -- Fabio Zadrozny ------------------------------------------------------ Software Developer ESSS - Engineering Simulation and Scientific Software www.esss.com.br PyDev - Python Development Enviroment for Eclipse pydev.sf.net pydev.blogspot.com

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python-dev summary for 2005-07-01 to 2005-07-15
by Steven Bethard July 31, 2005

July 31, 2005

[The HTML version of this Summary is available at http://www.python.org/dev/summary/2005-07-01_2005-07-15.html] ============= Announcements ============= ------------------------------ QOTF (Quotes of the Fortnight) ------------------------------ Marc-Andre Lemburg provides perhaps the best summary to date of `how strings and Unicode should be used`_ in Python: To untie this Gordian Knot, we should use strings and Unicode like they are supposed to be used (in the context of text data): * strings are fine for text data that is encoded using the default encoding * Unicode should be used for all text data that is not or cannot be encoded in the default encoding Later on in Py3k, all text data should be stored in Unicode and all binary data in some new binary type. On a more entertaining note, Anthony Baxter describes the general outlook outlook on handling `threads vs signals`_: threads vs signals is a platform-dependant trail of misery, despair, horror and madness .. _how strings and Unicode should be used: http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054854.html .. _threads vs signals: http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054832.html ========= Summaries ========= --------------------------------------- PEP 343 Documentation: Context Managers --------------------------------------- Raymond Hettinger started a thread discussing how objects with __enter__ and __exit__ methods should be referred to in the official Python documentation. A few terms were thrown around, with "resource manager" being one of the early favorites. However, because the __enter__/__exit__ protocol handles a much more general construct that just the acquisition and release of a resource, this term steadily lost ground. Things like "locking objects are resource managed" and "decimal.Context() is a resource manager" sounded awkward and hard to explain. Phillip J. Eby suggested that objects with __enter__ and __exit__ methods could be called "context managers", and people seemed generally happy with this term. Nick Coghlan took this term, and some example use cases for "context managers", and put together a `draft documentation`_ for the section in the Python Library Reference. People liked Nick's wording, and after a few minor revisions (mainly to add more examples), it looked pretty complete. Nick promised to add a bit to the Python tutorial after he got a chance to play with the PEP 342_/343_ implementations. There was also a brief followup thread that discussed which objects in the stdlib should gain __enter__ and __exit__ methods in Python 2.5. It looks like decimal.Context objects will almost certainly become context managers, and there is some chance that a sys.redirected_stdout context manager might appear. .. _draft documentation: http://www.python.org/sf/1234057 .. _342: http://www.python.org/sf/1223381 .. _343: http://python.org/sf/1235943 Contributing threads: - `Terminology for PEP 343 <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-June/054525.html>`__ - `Terminology for PEP 343 <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054530.html>`__ - `'With' context documentation draft (was Re: Terminology for PEP 343 <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054658.html>`__ - `PEP 343 documentation on Sourceforge Patch tracker <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054688.html>`__ - `Possible context managers in stdlib <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054762.html>`__ [SJB] ----------------------- GCC/G++ Issues on Linux ----------------------- While in the past Python and Python extension modules could be compiled on Linux with different GCC versions as long as the 'C' ABIs were compatible, David Abrahams reported that Python extensions on Linux now crash if they are not compiled with exactly the same version of GCC as the Python they're loaded into. This is apparently due to the fact that on these systems Python is being linked with CXX when it should be linked with CC. The solution turned out to be to pass --without-cxx to configure; if it is not specified, configure runs a linking test that (improperly) determines that linking with CXX is necessary. When the --without-cxx flag is specified, configure does not perform this linking test, so Python is linked with CC. In the same discussion, Christoph Ludwig pointed out another problem in the above linking test. The current test compiles a single translation unit program using CXX and sees if linking it using CC fails. For GCC 3.x, it does, but because GCC 4.0 does a better job of eliminating unreachable code, with GCC 4.0 it does not. Thus make fails using GCC 4.0. Christoph showed that compiling a program with two tranlation units, one of which calls an 'extern "C"' function in the other, restores the original behavior. He provided the corresponding patch_ to configure.in. While Christoph's patch stops make from failing on Linux with ELF shared binaries and GCC 4.x, it did not address David Abrahams original concern -- that on Linux with ELF shared binaries and GCC 3.x or 4.x, configure should determine that Python can be compiled *without* CXX. Christoph promised to work on a more comprehensive patch to address this problem for Python 2.5. .. _patch: http://www.python.org/sf/1239112 Contributing threads: - `GCC version compatibility <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054686.html>`__ - `Linux Python linking with G++? <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054693.html>`__ - `[C++-sig] GCC version compatibility <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054794.html>`__ [SJB] -------------------------------------------------------- Behavior of Sourceforge when replying to python-checkins -------------------------------------------------------- At the moment, replying to a message in the check-ins list defaults to directing the reply to python-dev. After this lead to some confusion, Guido questioned whether this was a good idea or not; the two main problems are that it is more difficult than necessary to send notes to the committer, and difficult to follow such threads (the past is in the check-in message, and future messages might be on python-dev or the check-ins list). Only one person replied to Guido's suggestion (agreeing) - nothing appears to have changed so far, so it seems that perhaps the status quo rules. Contributing thread: - `floatobject.c 2.136 <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054617.html>`__ [TAM] ---------------------------------------- Removing else clauses from while and for ---------------------------------------- Thomas Lotze suggested that an 'eltry' keyword be introduced, to be the counterpart of 'elif' for try statements; this idea was quickly shot down by Guido (the use case is rare, using both "else" and "try" is fine, a loop solution often works well). As a result, however, Guido wondered whether else clauses on for/while were a good idea, even though he dislikes flag variables. He was joined by various people, some of whom did not know (or had forgotten) that the clauses even existed - some people wondered whether they made the language harder to learn. These people were outnumbered, though, but people who felt that these loop else clauses were an elegant part of the language and should definitely stay. Interestingly, Guido noted that he wonders whether "elif" was a mistake, and should have been "else if" (although there was no indication that he felt that this should be changed in Python 3000). Contributing thread: - `Chaining try statements: eltry? <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054667.html>`__ [TAM] --------------------------------------------------------- Adding Syntactic Support for Instance Variable Assignment --------------------------------------------------------- Ralf W. Grosse-Kunstleve asked for syntactic support for the common idiom:: def __init__(self, x, y, z): self.x = x self.y = y self.z = z using the syntax:: def __init__(self, .x, .y, .z): pass People pointed out that with a properly-defined initialize() function you could use existing Python syntax and only need a single function call in __init__:: def __init__(self, x, y, z): initialize(self, locals()) The thread_ was moved to comp.lang.python before it had a chance to turn into a decorator-syntax-like discussion. ;) .. _thread: http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/2005-July/288292.html Contributing thread: - `reducing self.x=x; self.y=y; self.z=z boilerplate code <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054568.html>`__ [SJB] ------------------------------------- Changing Triple-quoted String Parsing ------------------------------------- Andrew Durdin suggested a change in the way that triple-quoted strings are parsed. Strings like:: myverylongvariablename = """\ This line is indented, But this line is not. Note the trailing newline: """ would have the initial indents on all lines but the first ignored when they were parsed. People seemed generally to dislike the proposal, for a number of reasons: - "It smells too much of DWIM, which is very unpythonic" -- Guido - it is backwards incompatible in a number of ways - textwrap.dedent covers pretty much all of the use cases Andrew Durdin said he would write the PEP anyway so that at least if the idea was rejected, there would be some official documentation of the rejection. Contributing thread: - `Triple-quoted strings and indentation <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054649.html>`__ [SJB] ----------------------- path module and Unicode ----------------------- Continuing last month's discussion on including the path module in the standard library, Neil Hodgson pointed out that path makes it easier to handle Unicode directory paths on Windows-based platforms; currently, this requires user code. Further replies pointed out similar Unicode handling problems in sys.argv and os.listdir, leading Guido to comment, "Face it. Unicode stinks (from the programmer's POV). But we'll have to live with it." Neil boiled this down to four high-level strategies for dealing with attributes that can Unicode: always returning Unicode, returning Unicode only when a value can't be represented in ASCII, returning Unicode only when a value can't be represented in the current code page, or creating "separate-but-equal" APIs (like sys.argvu and os.environu). Marc-Andre Lemburg and Guido both expressed strong preferences for the second option, with Marc-Andre formulating the rule as presented in this issue's QotF. Contributing threads: - `Adding the 'path' module (was Re: Some RFE for review) <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054535.html>`__ - `Adding the 'path' module (was Re: Some RFE for review) <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054796.html>`__ - `Adding the 'path' module (was Re: Some RFE for review) <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054857.html>`__ [TDL] -------------------------------------- Improving decimal module documentation -------------------------------------- Facundo Bastista couldn't find the explanation of the decimal module's rounding modes. Nick Coghlan helped him find it in section for `Context objects`_ but noted that the wording for the round-half modes was sparse. Raymond Hettinger then improved the docs by adding a few words to the effect that the various round-half modes are rules for breaking ties when two integers are equally near. He also switched the presentation from paragraph-form to list-form so to make it easier to find and read. .. _Context objects: http://docs.python.org/lib/decimal-decimal.html Contributing threads: - `Decimal rounding doc <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054543.html>`__ - `Missing docs (was Decimal rounding doc) <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054553.html>`__ [TAM] ---------------- getch() behavior ---------------- Darryl Dixon pointed out that the getpass() function in the getpass module does not accept extended characters on Windows, where the msvcrt module is used to capture one character at a time from stdin via the _getch() function defined in conio.h. Windows supports `capturing extended characters`_ via _getch, but it requires making a second call to getch() if one of the 'magic' returns is encountered in the first call (0x00 or 0xE0). Darryl asked whether a patch for the msvcrt module that added support for capturing extended characters would be considered. However, no support was received (although it was suggested that a patch submitted through sourceforge, possibly implemented via a new function, would be considered), as the thinness of the msvcrt wrapper is intentional, and it was not clear that this was a problem (i.e., that two calls could not be made). .. _capturing extended characters: http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;57888 Contributing threads: - `getch() in msvcrt does not accept extended characters. <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-June/054506.html>`__ - `getch() in msvcrt does not accept extended characters. <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054539.html>`__ [TAM] ------------------- Threads and signals ------------------- Florent Pillet noticed that when using Python 2.3 on Max OS X, calling tmpfile() from a C extension had the side-effect of disabling Control-C keyboard interruption (SIGINT). Further digging revealed that on both Darwin and FreeBSD platforms, tmpfile() does play with the signal handling, but appears to change it back. Michael Hudson noted that Florent's code also involved threads, and that mixing threads and signal handling involved "enormously subtle" issues. Anthony Baxter also replied that Python 2.4 should be less subject to harmful effects from these bugs, but as a rule, mixing threads and signals is a recipe for "misery, despair, horror, and madness." Contributing threads: - `C bindings calling tmpfile() blocks interrupt signal <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054690.html>`__ [TDL] -------- List API -------- Nicolas Fleury proposed adding copy() and clear() functions to lists, to be more consistent with dict and set. It was pointed out that the copy module (copy.copy()) can be used for generic copying, or a copy constructor and that clearing can be done with slicing (seq[:] = []) or the del keyword (del seq[:]). The advocate of the clear method argued that a clear() method would be easy to find in documentation, and wouldn't require understanding slicing to use it, but none of the developers would agree to expand the API just to add a third-way to do it, so it seems unlikely that anything more will come of this at this time. Raymond Hettinger also noted that slicing is one of the first concepts presented in the tutorial -- it is so basic to the language that it would be a mistake steer people away from learning it. Contributing threads: - `List copy and clear (was Re: Inconsistent API for sets.Set and build-in set) <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-June/054522.html>`__ - `List copy and clear (was Re: Inconsistent API for sets.Set and build-in set) <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054527.html>`__ [TAM] ------------ Money Module ------------ Facundo Batista announced that the `Money module`_ is taking form quickly, a "pre-PEP", and unit tests have been written. Raymond Hettinger and Aahz noted that a "pre-PEP" is really a misnomer: PEPs describe enhancements to the Python core and standard library, while Money is still rather experimental and unlikely to see inclusion anytime soon. Facundo invited any interested parties to join the discussion in the pymoney-general list on SourceForge. .. _Money module: http://sourceforge.net/projects/pymoney Contributing threads: - `Money module <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054558.html>`__ [TDL] ------------------------ Bug-reporting Checklists ------------------------ Brett Cannon posted a draft of a checklist to help users report bugs. Several minor improvements were suggested, but Raymond Hettinger expressed mild dislike for the idea, describing it as "administrivia" that might actually prevent people from filing bugs. Terry Reedy suggested, along with the checklists, some minor changes to the structure of the python.org site (to define bugs, help determine whether a bug has already been reported, etc.) would help even more. Contributing threads: - `checklist for filing a bug <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054737.html>`__ [TDL] =============== Skipped Threads =============== - `how to create single exe dos file <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054536.html>`__ - `cephes module missing <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054537.html>`__ - `Inconsistent API for sets.Set and build-in set <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054560.html>`__ - `python-dev Summary for 2005-06-16 through 2005-06-30 [draft] <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054624.html>`__ - `using pyhon from the MSYS shell <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054636.html>`__ - `Possible C API problem? <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054638.html>`__ - `Weekly Python Patch/Bug Summary <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054648.html>`__ - `Expanding max chunk size to 4GB. <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054671.html>`__ - `Request to add developer <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054674.html>`__ - `C bindings calling tmpfileblocks interrupt signal <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054690.html>`__ - `Another SoC student for CVS access <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054718.html>`__ - `__autoinit__ <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054788.html>`__ - `SF patch #1214889 - file.encoding support <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054870.html>`__ - `e-mail addresses <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054874.html>`__ - `[Python-checkins] python/dist/src/Miscdevelopers.txt, 1.15, 1.16 <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054876.html>`__ - `Is PEP 237 final -- Unifying Long Integers and Integers <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054879.html>`__ - `Python on PyPI <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2005-July/054880.html>`__ ======== Epilogue ======== ------------ Introduction ------------ This is a summary of traffic on the `python-dev mailing list`_ from July 01, 2005 through July 15, 2005. It is intended to inform the wider Python community of on-going developments on the list on a semi-monthly basis. An archive_ of previous summaries is available online. An `RSS feed`_ of the titles of the summaries is available. You can also watch comp.lang.python or comp.lang.python.announce for new summaries (or through their email gateways of python-list or python-announce, respectively, as found at http://mail.python.org). This is the seventh summary written by the python-dev summary cabal of Steve Bethard, Tim Lesher, and Tony Meyer. To contact us, please send email: - Steve Bethard (steven.bethard at gmail.com) - Tim Lesher (tlesher at gmail.com) - Tony Meyer (tony.meyer at gmail.com) Do *not* post to comp.lang.python if you wish to reach us. The `Python Software Foundation`_ is the non-profit organization that holds the intellectual property for Python. It also tries to advance the development and use of Python. If you find the python-dev Summary helpful please consider making a donation. You can make a donation at http://python.org/psf/donations.html . Every penny helps so even a small donation with a credit card, check, or by PayPal helps. -------------------- Commenting on Topics -------------------- To comment on anything mentioned here, just post to `comp.lang.python`_ (or email python-list at python.org which is a gateway to the newsgroup) with a subject line mentioning what you are discussing. All python-dev members are interested in seeing ideas discussed by the community, so don't hesitate to take a stance on something. And if all of this really interests you then get involved and join `python-dev`_! ------------------------- How to Read the Summaries ------------------------- The in-development version of the documentation for Python can be found at http://www.python.org/dev/doc/devel/ and should be used when looking up any documentation for new code; otherwise use the current documentation as found at http://docs.python.org/ . PEPs (Python Enhancement Proposals) are located at http://www.python.org/peps/ . To view files in the Python CVS online, go to http://cvs.sourceforge.net/cgi-bin/viewcvs.cgi/python/ . Reported bugs and suggested patches can be found at the SourceForge_ project page. Please note that this summary is written using reStructuredText_. Any unfamiliar punctuation is probably markup for reST_ (otherwise it is probably regular expression syntax or a typo =); you can safely ignore it. I do suggest learning reST, though; it's simple and is accepted for `PEP markup`_ and can be turned into many different formats like HTML and LaTeX. Unfortunately, even though reST is standardized, the wonders of programs that like to reformat text do not allow me to guarantee you will be able to run the text version of this summary through Docutils_ as-is unless it is from the `original text file`_. .. _python-dev: http://www.python.org/dev/ .. _SourceForge: http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?group_id=5470 .. _python-dev mailing list: http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-dev .. _c.l.py: .. _comp.lang.python: http://groups.google.com/groups?q=comp.lang.python .. _PEP Markup: http://www.python.org/peps/pep-0012.html .. _Docutils: http://docutils.sf.net/ .. _reST: .. _reStructuredText: http://docutils.sf.net/rst.html .. _PSF: .. _Python Software Foundation: http://python.org/psf/ .. _last summary: http://www.python.org/dev/summary/ .. _original text file: http://www.python.org/dev/summary/2005-07-01_2005-07-15.ht .. _archive: http://www.python.org/dev/summary/ .. _RSS feed: http://www.python.org/dev/summary/channews.rdf

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ANN: cssutils 0.8a2 (alpha release)
by Christof July 31, 2005

July 31, 2005

what is it ---------- A Python package to parse and build CSS Cascading Style Sheets. Partly implements the DOM Level 2 Stylesheets and DOM Level 2 CSS interfaces. The implementation uses some Python standard features like standard lists for classes like css.CSSRuleList and is hopefully a bit easier to use. changes since the last release ------------------------------ **MAJOR API CHANGE** reflecting DOM Level 2 Stylesheets and DOM Level 2 CSS see http://cthedot.de/cssutils/ for a complete list of changes, examples, etc. license ------- cssutils is published under the LGPL. download -------- download cssutils 0.8a2 alpha - 050731 from http://cthedot.de/cssutils/ This is an alpha release so use at your own risk! Some parts will not work as expected... Any bug report is welcome. cssutils needs * Python 2.3 (tested with Python 2.4.1 on Windows XP only) * maybe PyXML (tested with PyXML 0.8.4 installed) any comment will be appreciated, thanks christof hoeke <P><A HREF="http://cthedot.de/cssutils/">cssutils 0.8a2</A> - cssutils - CSS Cascading Style Sheets library for Python (31-Jul-05)

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Beginning Python Class -- Federal Way, WA, USA
by jgardner＠jonathangardner.net July 29, 2005

July 29, 2005

I am developing a Beginning Python course taught in the Federal Way, WA, USA area. (This includes surrounding areas such as Auburn, Tacoma, and Seattle.) The course is managed under the Mayo Learning Institute. It will be taught every Friday evening from September 9th, 2005 to November 19th, 2005, 7-9PM at the Intellipass building. (See http://intellipass.com/directions.asp for directions and location.) We will cover all the basics of the Python programming language and teach skills fundamental to programming. The material is aimed at the absolute beginner or those with only limited experience programming in another language. The registration fee is only $20 to cover material costs and room rental. The registration form is available at http://www.jonathangardner.net/python-class/registration.pdf . Please complete and return the form early if you are interested because there is only limited space. Questions? Email me at jgardner(a)jonathangardner.net.

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Dr. Dobb's Python-URL! - weekly Python news and links (Jul 29)
by Simon Brunning July 29, 2005

July 29, 2005

QOTW: "Guido has marked the trail; don't ignore the signs unless you really know where you're going." - Raymond Hettinger 'Proverbs 28:14 JPS "Happy is the man that feareth alway; but he that hardeneth his heart shall fall into evil." Obviously an exhortation to not ignore raised exceptions with "except: pass".' - Robert Kern Jason Orendorff's path module is a popular alternative to the build in os.path and shutil modules. Michael Hoffman and Reinhold Birkenfeld are working on a PEP suggesting that it be included in the standard library: http://groups-beta.google.com/group/comp.lang.python/browse_thread/thread/1… http://groups-beta.google.com/group/comp.lang.python/browse_thread/thread/d… Java has nearly as many web frameworks as Python, but you can run any of them on any of the Java web application servers because they are all built on the Java Servlet specification. PEP 333, the Python Web Server Gateway Interface, aims to bring something similar to the world of Python: http://www.python.org/peps/pep-0333.html A short but sweet day-of-the-month suffix generator from John Machin: http://groups-beta.google.com/group/comp.lang.python/browse_thread/thread/9… Thanos Tsouanas wants access to an object's namespace dictionary: http://groups-beta.google.com/group/comp.lang.python/browse_thread/thread/d… David Isaac wants to avoid map(), but he wants a zip() function that runs to the length of the longest sequence. It's suggested that zip() should be able to do this, but Raymond Hettinger channels Guido and thinks that this would be a bad idea: http://groups-beta.google.com/group/comp.lang.python/browse_thread/thread/2… Tiny.be release four open source enterprise applications: http://lwn.net/Articles/145209/ Who needs "Ten Essential Development Practices"? We've got The Zen of Python: http://groups-beta.google.com/group/comp.lang.python/browse_thread/thread/c… ======================================================================== 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 marvelous 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. For far, FAR more Python reading than any one mind should absorb, much of it quite interesting, several pages index much of the universe of Pybloggers. http://lowlife.jp/cgi-bin/moin.cgi/PythonProgrammersWeblog http://www.planetpython.org/ http://mechanicalcat.net/pyblagg.html comp.lang.python.announce announces new Python software. Be sure to scan this newsgroup weekly. http://groups.google.com/groups?oi=djq&as_ugroup=comp.lang.python.announce Steve Bethard, Tim Lesher, and Tony Meyer continue the marvelous tradition early borne by Andrew Kuchling, Michael Hudson and Brett Cannon of intelligently 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/ Python Success Stories--from air-traffic control to on-line match-making--can inspire you or decision-makers to whom you're subject with a vision of what the language makes practical. http://www.pythonology.com/success The Python Software Foundation (PSF) has replaced the Python Consortium as an independent nexus of activity. It has official responsibility for Python's development and maintenance. http://www.python.org/psf/ Among the ways you can support PSF is with a donation. http://www.python.org/psf/donate.html Kurt B. Kaiser publishes a weekly report on faults and patches. http://www.google.com/groups?as_usubject=weekly%20python%20patch Cetus collects Python hyperlinks. http://www.cetus-links.org/oo_python.html Python FAQTS http://python.faqts.com/ The Cookbook is a collaborative effort to capture useful and interesting recipes. http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python Among several Python-oriented RSS/RDF feeds available are http://www.python.org/channews.rdf http://bootleg-rss.g-blog.net/pythonware_com_daily.pcgi http://python.de/backend.php For more, see http://www.syndic8.com/feedlist.php?ShowMatch=python&ShowStatus=all 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(a)pythonjournal.com and editor(a)pythonjournal.cognizor.com welcome submission of material that helps people's understanding of Python use, and offer Web presentation of your work. del.icio.us presents an intriguing approach to reference commentary. It already aggregates quite a bit of Python intelligence. http://del.icio.us/tag/python *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.pyth… Previous - (U)se the (R)esource, (L)uke! - messages are listed here: http://www.ddj.com/topics/pythonurl/ (requires subscription) http://groups-beta.google.com/groups?q=python-url+group:comp.lang.python*&s… http://purl.org/thecliff/python/url.html (dormant) or http://groups.google.com/groups?oi=djq&as_q=+Python-URL!&as_ugroup=comp.lan… Suggestions/corrections for next week's posting are always welcome. E-mail to <Python-URL(a)phaseit.net> should get through. To receive a new issue of this posting in e-mail each Monday morning (approximately), ask <claird(a)phaseit.net> 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.

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ANN: XIST 2.11 released
by Walter Dörwald July 29, 2005

July 29, 2005

XIST 2.11 has been released! What is it? =========== XIST is an extensible HTML/XML generator written in Python. XIST is also a DOM parser (built on top of SAX2) with a very simple and Pythonesque tree API. Every XML element type corresponds to a Python class, and these Python classes provide a conversion method to transform the XML tree (e.g. into HTML). XIST can be considered "object oriented XSL". What's new in version 2.11? =========================== * A script xml2xsc.py has been added, that can be used to parse an XML file and generate a rudimentary XIST namespace from it. * A DocType for XHTML 1.1 has been added (suggested by Elvelind Grandin). * Line number information is now added when parsing HTML. * The sorted method now supports the same arguments (cmp, key and reverse) as list.sort and sorted in Python 2.4. * The walk doesn't yield the node directly, but yields a Cursor object now, with has several ways of referencing the node. * New methods walknode, walkpath and walkindex have been added. * Presenters use an iterator API instead of a stream API now. Dumping an XML tree presentation to the terminal can now start immediately instead of having to wait for the complete string to be formatted. * Fixed a bug with element/attribute names that contained a . character. (This broke ll.xist.ns.fo.) * Fixed a bug with xmlns attributes in nested elements. When an element ended the parser restored the wrong prefix mapping. * The python-quotes demo has been updated to use the current version of AMK's XML file. * Removed iterator stuff from ll.xist.xfind, as this is now part of the ll package/module. * The function ToNode has been renamed to tonode. * ll.xist.Context now longer subclasses list. * ll.xist.ns.doc.explain will now try to output the objects in the order in which they appear in the Python source. * The node methods find and findfirst have been removed. * ll.xist.ns.cond now uses a sandbox dictionary in a converter context for evaluating expression. For changes in older versions see: http://www.livinglogic.de/Python/xist/History.html Where can I get it? =================== XIST can be downloaded from http://ftp.livinglogic.de/xist/ or ftp://ftp.livinglogic.de/pub/livinglogic/xist/ Web pages are at http://www.livinglogic.de/Python/xist/ ViewCVS access is available at http://www.livinglogic.de/viewcvs/ For information about the mailing lists go to http://www.livinglogic.de/Python/xist/Mailinglists.html Bye, Walter Dörwald

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ANN: Tahchee v.0.9.0 (intial release)
by Sébastien Pierre July 29, 2005

July 29, 2005

Hi all, This is the first public release of Tahchee - a static website build system that uses the Cheetah template system. Tahchee is a tool for developers and webdesigner that allows to easily build a static website using the Cheetah template system. It was created to fill in the gap between bare templates and macro- processing systems and dynamic template-based websites. Tahchee acts both as a build system (à la "make") as well as an extension to the Cheetah template system that makes it really easy to build small to medium-sized websites. Tachee is ideal for writing open-source project or small-company websites. Check the homepage at (http:/www.ivy.fr/tahchee), where you can learn more and download the latest version. Tahchee is released under the revised BSD license. Enjoy, -- Sébastien

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AOPython 1.0
by Daniel Miller July 29, 2005

July 29, 2005

I've written a small AOP module for Python called aopython: Aspect Oriented Python. Read about it (as I write more in the future): http://www.openpolitics.com/pieces/ Download the source: http://www.openpolitics.com/pieces/archives/aopython-v1.0.zip <p><a href="http://www.openpolitics.com/pieces/archives/001694.html">AOPython 1.0</a> - Aspect Oriented Python (21-Jul-05)</p> -- ~ Daniel Miller millerdev(a)gmail.com

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Ann: Registration for the Python Game Programming Challenge is now open!
by pyweek1＠mechanicalcat.net July 29, 2005

July 29, 2005

Registration is now open for the first Python Game Programming Challenge (also known as PyWeek). The challenge runs from Sunday August 28th to Sunday September 4th. That means there's only (checks website) 29 days to go before the challenge starts! Full details about the challenge, and registration, at the website: http://www.mechanicalcat.net/tech/PyWeek/ You may enter either individually or as a team. If you're keen and would like to join a team, but can't organise your friends, then sign up anyway and offer your services to other entrants. The challenge will use skills in Python programming, graphics, sound or music. For those who came in late, the PyWeek challenge: 1. Invites entrants to create a game (coded in Python) in one week from scratch either as an individual or in a team, 2. Aims to be challenging and fun, 3. Entries must be developed during the competition, and must incorporate some theme decided at the start of the competition, 4. Will hopefully increase the public body of python game tools, code and expertise, 5. Will let a lot of people actually finish a game, and 6. May inspire new projects (with ready made teams!) -- Visit the PyWeek website: http://www.mechanicalcat.net/tech/PyWeek/

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