[Baypiggies] Relative Python newbie baypiggies talk wish list

[John J. Dooley]

At the Nov baypiggies meeting someone floated the idea for future meeting(s) 
that would present resources useful to Python newbies. I am not sure what 
was intended but after my own struggle to get my feet wet, I am at the point 
where I sort of know what I don't know.

I have the suspicion that an effective way to learn Python(I am not just 
talking about the core language but to effectively use it in real projects) 
is to undestand "cherry picked" Python projects - those projects that are 
acknowledged success. Perhaps, these projects are old hat and a little 
borring for the Python experts.

Anyway, here is my dream list:

  Twisted Architecture - useful to practically everyone

  Zope 3 Component model - how to structure massive Python projects

  Ajax - Last night I attended the ACCU's Ajax presentation by Greg Murray. 
It pulled in 72, a 5 year record for ACCU SV. This is the oddball in the 
list - it is nearly all legacy (XHTML, CSS, Javscript) so except for the 
approach.

Nevow - Think this is useful but would love to get an overview. Something 
that would let me decide whether this is a "learn now" or "learn later".

  IDEs - A state of the art overview - Even if I swear by  vIm  or emacs, 
when I praise Python to the unwashed the IDE question is not far behind.

Other topics that might be useful: Zope 3 in general, TurboGears.

I am not sure what was intended by "presenting resources" to the newbie, but 
the "case study" approach seems to be working for me. The newbie can learn 
lot by poreing over the Python legacy, and a few presentations could help 
him identify the most "Pythonic" of these.