Development tools and practices for Pythonistas

[Algis Kabaila]

On Wednesday 27 April 2011 09:41:53 Ben Finney wrote:
> Chris Angelico <rosuav at gmail.com> writes:
> > As other people have said, version control is very handy. I
> > use git myself, but imho the choice of _which_ VCS you use
> > is far less important than the choice of _whether_ to use
> > one.
> 
> True enough. But the modern crop of first-tier VCSen –
> Bazaar, Git, Mercurial – are the ones to choose from.
> Anoyone recommending a VCS tool that has poor merging
> support (such as Subversion or, heaven help us, CVS) is
> doing the newcomer a disservice.
> 
All golden advice!  Two things were not mentioned:

1. Work on an existing project that is based on Python. The 
"Launchpad" of ubuntu has a great environment for a project. 
There are many existing projects in which to participate.  Even 
Bazaar's GUI version is programmed in Python with PyQt for the 
GUI proper.  You will get a lot out of participation in an 
existing project, probably a lot more than you input.  
Ultimately it is how much you input that is of of most benefit 
to you yourself.

2. I failed to see questions and suggestions of platform to work 
from.  Your experience, interests,  and computer platform will 
determine what is useful to you and what is less useful.

3. Finally, it is important to have a project about which you 
can master enough enthusiasm to persist.  "What project " 
depends very much on item 2.

May the favourable wind fill your sails,

OldAl.
-- 
Algis
http://akabaila.pcug.org.au/StructuralAnalysis.pdf