[Edu-sig] education as Python killer app

[kirby urner]

On 5/26/07, Jeff Rush <jeff at taupro.com> wrote:

> I tossed together a very rough wiki page of some ideas I've been kicking
> around.  These resources attempt to answer a response I get frequently when I
> push the learning of Python, that of "but what would I -do- with Python once I
> learned it?".
>
>  http://wiki.python.org/moin/Advocacy/ProgrammingForNewprogrammers
>

Thanks for getting this going.

Re: http://wiki.python.org/moin/ConceptualRoadmap

I'd suggest delisting VPython as one of the interpreters
(amidst Jython and IronPython) because it's not really
a Python shell or interpreter, offering interactive use of
the language, but a C++ library and API focussed on
OpenGL type stuff pretty exclusively.

VPython is like wxPython in that sense, but with a
different purpose (tho partially overlapping as wx provides
a window into OpenGL -- which I've never used very
successfully (whereas VPython has been at the basis
of several Pythonic math courses I've taught)).

VPython does integrate with IDLE pretty well, which
is maybe where this impression of VPython being its
own Python interpreter is coming from.  iPython is a
wrapper for CPython that doesn't use Tk or IDLE --
or is it a wrapper for Jython as well?  I've used it, but
haven't explored it in great depth.  Seem to recall
needing ctypes to run it, at least on a Windows box.

I think CP4E ultimately requires stepping outside the
scope of any one language and getting more into the
bigger picture.  I think a basic understanding of tcp/ip
is maybe where to start with a lot of students.  There's
a basic "how it works" flavor to it.  I suggest screening
'Warriors of the Net' for starters, which comes in a
variety of languages, could come in even more.

Kirby