Mailman 3 June 2006 - Python-announce-list

ANN: xturtle.py - a new Tkinter based turtle graphics module
by Gregor Lingl 28 Jun '06

28 Jun '06

xturtle.py, extended turtle graphics a new turtle graphics module for Python and Tkinter Version 0.91 of xturtle.py has been released. A zip file containing the module and supplementary material can be found at: http://ada.rg16.asn-wien.ac.at/~python/xturtle xturtle should work properly on all major platforms (Mac, Linux and Windows) Feedback would be appreciated to take it into account for polishing xturtle to a final version 1.0. xturtle.py is a module designed to help you learn and/or teach computer programming using Python. Turtle graphics provides a means for the beginning programmers to get immediate visual feedback about the correct working of her programs. It's main goal is to provide easy access to a sufficiently rich graphics toolkit. It needs only the standard distribution of python (incl. Tkinter) and imho it (or some descendant of it) once (soon?) could (and should?) replace turtle.py which is contained in the current standard distribution. xturtle.zip contains xturtle.py and three supplementary elements: ( 0. the module xturtle.py ). 1. set of 25+ sample scripts of great variety to show possible uses of xturtle.py 2. A simple demoViewer to run and view those sample scripts 3. documentation in form of *.txt files, which also can be viewed with the demoViewer. Docs are derived from doc strings. thus Python's help utility works fine with the module xturtle.py For more information (e.g. some screenshots) see the web page mentioned above. Gregor

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itools 0.13.6 released
by "J. David Ibáñez" 28 Jun '06

28 Jun '06

itools is a Python library, it groups a number of packages into a single meta-package for easier development and deployment: itools.catalog itools.i18n itools.uri itools.cms itools.ical itools.web itools.csv itools.resources itools.workflow itools.datatypes itools.rss itools.xhtml itools.gettext itools.schemas itools.xliff itools.handlers itools.stl itools.xml itools.html itools.tmx Changes: URI - Add the method "replace" to uri objects (this makes the method "Request.build_url" from itools.web obsolete). Datatypes - Add a datatype for decimal numbers, by Hervé Cauwelier [#330]. Handlers - Revert the lazy load patch. CSV - Now "get_rows" is a generator, by Hervé Cauwelier [#312]. iCalendar - Various API improvements, by Nicolas Deram [#246]. STL - Now "stl:content" coerces floats and decimals to strings, by Hervé Cauwelier [#331]. Web - Improve error logging, print the whole request headers. - Don't fail when the "Cookie" header is present with an empty value. CMS - Now locks expire in one hour, by Hervé Cauwelier [#250]. - Handler for Restructured Text files, by Hervé Cauwelier [#68]. - Minor user interface improvements, by Hervé Cauwelier [#324, #334, #340]. Resources --------- Download http://download.ikaaro.org/itools/itools-0.13.6.tar.gz Home http://www.ikaaro.org/itools Mailing list http://mail.ikaaro.org/mailman/listinfo/itools Bug Tracker http://bugs.ikaaro.org -- J. David Ibáñez Itaapy <http://www.itaapy.com> Tel +33 (0)1 42 23 67 45 9 rue Darwin, 75018 Paris Fax +33 (0)1 53 28 27 88

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lxml 1.0.2 and 1.1alpha released
by Stefan Behnel 28 Jun '06

28 Jun '06

Hi, I'm happy to announce the release of lxml 1.0.2 and 1.1alpha. The changes are listed below. As a brief introduction: """ lxml is a Pythonic binding for the libxml2 and libxslt libraries. It provides safe and convenient access to these libraries using the ElementTree API. It extends the ElementTree API significantly to offer support for XPath, RelaxNG, XML Schema, XSLT, C14N and much, much more. Its goals are: * Pythonic API. * Documented. http://codespeak.net/lxml/#documentation http://codespeak.net/lxml/FAQ.html * FAST! http://codespeak.net/lxml/performance.html * Use Python unicode strings in API. * Safe (no segfaults). * No manual memory management! (as opposed to the official libxml2 Python bindings) """ lxml 1.0.2 is a maintenance release for the stable and production-ready 1.0 series. Updating and upstream integration into distributions is recommended. lxml 1.1alpha is a preview release which adds loads of new features, including a SAX-like iterparse() function, multi-threading and advanced tree iteration. Bug reports and success stories sent to the mailing list are appreciated. The source as well as various eggs and installers are available from cheeseshop: http://cheeseshop.python.org/pypi/lxml/1.0.2 http://cheeseshop.python.org/pypi/lxml/1.1alpha Have fun, Stefan Changes in 1.0.2: Features added * Support for setting a custom default Element class as opposed to namespace specific classes (which still override the default class) Bugs fixed * Rare exceptions in Python list functions were not handled * Parsing accepted unicode strings with XML encoding declaration in certain cases * Parsing 8-bit encoded strings from StringIO objects raised an exception * Module function initThread() was removed - useless (and never worked) * XSLT and parser exception messages include the error line number Features added in 1.1alpha: * Module level iterwalk() function as 'iterparse' for trees * ElementTree compatible iterparse() module function * Element.nsmap property returns a mapping of all namespace prefixes known at the Element to their namespace URI * Reentrant threading support in RelaxNG, XMLSchema and XSLT * Threading support in parsers and serializers: o All in-memory operations (tostring, parse(StringIO), etc.) free the GIL o File operations (on file names) free the GIL o Reading from file-like objects frees the GIL and reacquires it for reading o Serialisation to file-like objects is single-threaded (high lock overhead) * Element iteration over XPath axes: o Element.iterdescendants() iterates over the descendants of an element o Element.iterancestors() iterates over the ancestors of an element (from parent to parent) o Element.itersiblings() iterates over either the following or preceding siblings of an element o Element.iterchildren() iterates over the children of an element in either direction o All iterators support the tag keyword argument to restrict the generated elements * Element.getnext() and Element.getprevious() return the direct siblings of an element

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Beta 0.22 of MMA - Musical MIDI Accompaniment
by bvdp＠xplornet.com 27 Jun '06

27 Jun '06

Beta 0.22 of MMA - Musical MIDI Accompaniment - is now available for downloading. Included in this release: Minor (and not-so-minor) bug fixes, added options to GROOVE selections, HARMONYVOLUME setting, FORCEOUT option for keyboard tracks, and some command line fixes. MMA is a accompaniment generator -- it creates midi tracks for a soloist to perform with. User supplied files contain pattern selections, chords, and MMA directives. For full details please visit: http://users.xplornet.com/~bvdp/mma/ If you have any questions or comments, please send them to: bvdp(a)xplornet.com

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OSDC 2006 -- CFP closes in 2.5 weeks!
by Richard Jones 27 Jun '06

27 Jun '06

http://www.osdc.com.au/papers/cfp06.html There are two and a half weeks to go to get your paper in for one of the best Australian conferences this year! The deadline for proposals is 12th July 2006. The Open Source Developers' Conference is an Australian conference designed for developers, by developers. It covers numerous programming languages across a range of operating systems. We're seeking papers on Open Source languages, technologies, projects and tools as well as topics of interest to Open Source developers. The conference will be held in Melbourne, Victoria (Monash University's Caulfield Campus) from the 6th to the 8th of December, 2006. Each day includes three streams of talks, social events and is fully catered with buffet lunch and morning, afternoon teas. For a list of conference presentations from last year visit: http://osdc2005.cgpublisher.com/proposals/ If you have any questions, or have never submitted a paper proposal before, please read our FAQ page at http://www.osdc.com.au/faq/ index.html If you don't find an answer there, please contact richard <at> osdc.com.au To submit a proposal, follow the instructions at http://www.osdc.com.au/papers/cfp06.html This year we're also going to run a day of tutorials. See the CFP for more information. We are also seeking expressions of interest for people to be part of the OSDC 2006 Programme Committee. The Committee's primary responsibility is assessing the proposals submitted by potential speakers. Please email richard <at> osdc.com.au if you are interested, indicating your open source development interests. We look forward to hearing from you! All the best, The OSDC 2006 committee.

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Vancouver Python Workshop - Talk submission deadline
by Brian Quinlan 26 Jun '06

26 Jun '06

What's New? =========== This is your last change to submit a talk for the Vancouver Python Workshop. Talks will be accepted until Friday June 16th. This is a great opportunity for you to share your project or interests with the Python community, so please take advantage of it! To submit a talk, see: http://www.vanpyz.org/conference/talksubmission.html About the Vancouver Python Workshop =================================== The conference will begin with keynote addresses on August 4st by Guido van Rossum [1], Jim Hugunin [2], and Ian Cavén [3]. Further talks (and tutorials for beginners) will take place on August 5th and 6th. The Vancouver Python Workshop is a community organized and designed for both the beginner and for the experienced Python programmer with: * tutorials for beginning programmers * advanced lectures for Python experts * case studies of Python in action * after-hours social events * informative keynote speakers * tracks on multimedia, Web development, education and more More information see: http://www.vanpyz.org/conference/ or contact Brian Quinlan at: brian(a)sweetapp.com Vancouver ========= In addition to the opportunity to learn and socialize with fellow Pythonistas, the Vancouver Python Workshop also gives visitors the opportunity to visit one of the most extraordinary cities in the world [4]. For more information about traveling to Vancouver, see: http://www.vanpyz.org/conference/vancouver.html http://www.tourismvancouver.com http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vancouver Important dates =============== Talk proposals accepted: May 15th to June 15th Early registration (discounted): May 22nd to June 30th Normal registration: from July 1st Keynotes: August 4th Conference and tutorial dates: August 5th and 6th [1] Guido van Rossum (Google) is the inventor of Python and has managed its growth and development for more than a decade. Guido was awarded the Free Software Foundation Award in 2002 and Dr.Dobb's 1999 Excellence in Programming Award. Guido works at Google and spends half of his time on Python. [2] Jim Hugunin (Microsoft) is the creator of numerous innovations that take Python into new application domains. Jim's most recent project, IronPython integrates Python into Microsoft's .NET runtime. Jim's previous project, Jython is Python for the Java runtime and was the second production-quality implementation of Python. Before that, Jim's Numeric Python adapted Python to the needs of number crunching applications. Jim works at Microsoft adapting the .NET runtime to the needs of dynamic languages like Python. [3] Ian Cavén is the primary developer of the Lowry Digital Images motion picture restoration system. This Python and Zope-based system has been used to restore over 150 motion pictures. Highlights include Citizen Kane, Sunset Boulevard and both the Indiana Jones and Star Wars trilogies. While Ian was Chief Scientist at Lowry Digital, his rack of computers grew from a few Macintoshes on his desktop to over six hundred Macintosh and Linux servers - at one point earning Lowry the title as the second biggest installation of parallel processing Maintoshes in the world. In 2005, Lowry Digital Images was acquired by DTS (the famous movie audio company) and renamed DTS Digital Images. The motion picture restoration system has been discussed in publications as diverse as IEEE Spectrum, USA Today, the BBC NEWS, the New York Times and Apple.com. Ian has been a Python enthusiast since 1999. [4] http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/2299119.stm Cheers, Brian

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Dr. Dobb's Python-URL! - weekly Python news and links (Jun 26)
by Cameron Laird 26 Jun '06

26 Jun '06

QOTW: "In short, it's never what you think it is ;-)" - timbot, probably on the subject of performance "Real efficiency comes from elegant solutions, not optimized programs. Optimization is always just a few correctness-preserving transformations away." - Jonathan Sobel http://www.cs.indiana.edu/~jsobel/c455-c511.updated.txt Microsoft is (again) structuring its current marketing around "platforms", and apparently Python is starting to show up in the campaigns: http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2006/jun06/06-20MSRoboticsStudioPR… Intel puts Python to good use in commercial "program slicing": http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.python/browse_thread/thread/98cd59… Transcoding PVRs? Constructing collaborative whiteboards? Streaming multimedia in all directions? Apparently you can construct very impressive network-aware audiovisual applications *visually* with Kamaelia: http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.python/browse_thread/thread/36c894… If you only care about advanced concurrency methods, pipeline- based methods, and componentry, well, that's in there, too, wrapped as Axon: http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.python/msg/7a5f189e886d9fc0 Discussion about the new Python icons might inspire a reader to try them: http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.python/browse_thread/thread/204f27… Wow: PyPy is up to 0.9.0: http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.python.announce/msg/6fa325e6c0cdd5… Life becomes more sophisticated than ever before: http://golly.sourceforge.net/ Timbot illustrates how an experienced file-comparer thinks about performance hacks (and Windows): http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.python/msg/15d45c2b268fa410 ... and how much deeper one can analyze recursion and numerics than merely the "tastes great! less filling!" level: http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.python/msg/e67403fcaa06c022 http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.python/msg/4451e63833a0c1c1 ======================================================================== 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 Python411 indexes "podcasts ... to help people learn Python ..." Updates appear more-than-weekly: http://www.awaretek.com/python/index.html 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 Although unmaintained since 2002, the Cetus collection of Python hyperlinks retains a few gems. 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://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0042/ 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/topic/python/ (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… There is *not* an RSS for "Python-URL!"--at least not yet. Arguments for and against are occasionally entertained. 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!". Write to the same address to unsubscribe. -- 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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Pygame.draw challenge is over!
by richard＠pyweek.org 26 Jun '06

26 Jun '06

It was quite successful too! Download the submissions from the pyweek.org site: http://media.pyweek.org/static/pgd-200606.zip Congratulations to all who participated! Richard -- Visit the PyWeek website: http://www.pyweek.org/

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pypy-0.9.0: stackless, new extension compiler
by Michael Hudson 25 Jun '06

25 Jun '06

The PyPy development team has been busy working and we've now packaged our latest improvements, completed work and new experiments as version 0.9.0, our fourth public release. The highlights of this fourth release of PyPy are: **implementation of "stackless" features** We now support the larger part of the interface of the original Stackless Python -- see http://www.stackless.com for more. A significant part of this is the pickling and unpickling of a running tasklet. These features, especially the pickling, can be considered to be a "technology preview" -- they work, but for example the error handling is a little patchy in places. **ext-compiler** The "extension compiler" is a new way of writing a C extension for CPython and PyPy at the same time. For more information, see its documentation: http://codespeak.net/pypy/dist/pypy/doc/extcompiler.html **rctypes** Most useful in combination with the ext-compiler is the fact that our translation framework can translate code that uses the standard-in-Python-2.5 ctypes module. See its documentation for more: http://codespeak.net/pypy/dist/pypy/doc/rctypes.html **framework GCs** PyPy's interpreter can now be compiled to use a garbage collector written in RPython. This added control over PyPy's execution makes the implementation of new and interesting features possible, apart from being a significant achievement in its own right. **__del__/weakref/__subclasses__** The PyPy interpreter's compatibility with CPython continues improves: now we support __del__ methods, the __subclasses__ method on types and weak references. We now pass around 95% of CPython's core tests. **logic space preview** This release contains the first version of the logic object space, which will add logical variables to Python. See its docs for more: http://codespeak.net/pypy/dist/pypy/doc/howto-logicobjspace-0.9.html **high level backends preview** This release contains the first versions of new backends targeting high level languages such as Squeak and .NET/CLI and updated versions of the JavaScript and Common Lisp backends. They can't compile the PyPy interpreter yet, but they're getting there... **bugfixes, better performance** As you would expect, performance continues to improve and bugs continue to be fixed. The performance of the translated PyPy interpreter is 2.5-3x times faster than 0.8 (on richards and pystone), and is now stable enough to be able to run CPython's test suite to the end. **testing refinements** py.test, our testing tool, now has preliminary support for doctests. We now run all our tests every night, and you can see the summary at: http://snake.cs.uni-duesseldorf.de/pypytest/summary.html What is PyPy (about)? ------------------------------------------------ PyPy is a MIT-licensed research-oriented reimplementation of Python written in Python itself, flexible and easy to experiment with. It translates itself to lower level languages. Our goals are to target a large variety of platforms, small and large, by providing a compilation toolsuite that can produce custom Python versions. Platform, memory and threading models are to become aspects of the translation process - as opposed to encoding low level details into the language implementation itself. Eventually, dynamic optimization techniques - implemented as another translation aspect - should become robust against language changes. Note that PyPy is mainly a research and development project and does not by itself focus on getting a production-ready Python implementation although we do hope and expect it to become a viable contender in that area sometime next year. PyPy is partially funded as a research project under the European Union's IST programme. Where to start? ----------------------------- Getting started: http://codespeak.net/pypy/dist/pypy/doc/getting-started.html PyPy Documentation: http://codespeak.net/pypy/dist/pypy/doc/ PyPy Homepage: http://codespeak.net/pypy/ The interpreter and object model implementations shipped with the 0.9 version can run on their own and implement the core language features of Python as of CPython 2.4. However, we still do not recommend using PyPy for anything else than for education, playing or research purposes. Ongoing work and near term goals --------------------------------- The Just-in-Time compiler and other performance improvements will be one of the main topics of the next few months' work, along with finishing the logic object space. Project Details --------------- PyPy has been developed during approximately 20 coding sprints across Europe and the US. It continues to be a very dynamically and incrementally evolving project with many of these one-week workshops to follow. PyPy has been a community effort from the start and it would not have got that far without the coding and feedback support from numerous people. Please feel free to give feedback and raise questions. contact points: http://codespeak.net/pypy/dist/pypy/doc/contact.html have fun, the pypy team, (Armin Rigo, Samuele Pedroni, Holger Krekel, Christian Tismer, Carl Friedrich Bolz, Michael Hudson, and many others: http://codespeak.net/pypy/dist/pypy/doc/contributor.html) PyPy development and activities happen as an open source project and with the support of a consortium partially funded by a two year European Union IST research grant. The full partners of that consortium are: Heinrich-Heine University (Germany), AB Strakt (Sweden) merlinux GmbH (Germany), tismerysoft GmbH (Germany) Logilab Paris (France), DFKI GmbH (Germany) ChangeMaker (Sweden), Impara (Germany) -- I can't see a conspicuous evolutionary advantage in being good at higher mathematics. -- James Riden, asr

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Regular Toronto Python User's Group (PyGTA) meeting this Tuesday 7pm @ Linux Caffe
by Mike C. Fletcher 25 Jun '06

25 Jun '06

As usual, we'll be having our PyGTA meeting on the 4th Tuesday of the month, this month that's June 27th. We'll be continuing our discussion and review of web development frameworks. You can read about last month's reviews (TurboGears, Django and Zope2) here: http://blog.vrplumber.com/1478 If you have lots of experience with another framework, let me know at the meeting and we'll add that framework to the list being reviewed. Details available here: http://web.engcorp.com/pygta/wiki/NextMeeting Enjoy yourselves, Mike -- ________________________________________________ Mike C. Fletcher Designer, VR Plumber, Coder http://www.vrplumber.com http://blog.vrplumber.com

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Python-announce-list June 2006