[Tutor] little something in the way of file parsing

[Danny Yoo]

> The problem with reading source code is usually that it's just way to
> big to be able to just sit down and digest.  Really, I think it's the
> best way to learn (short of actually writing code), but usually I
> download some cool looking program like Zope or Xerces or something like
> that and I just get overwhelmed because the code extends over so many
> files and you don't know where half the references are coming from, et
> cetera.  This is the kind of thing that people can learn from.

We should do something sort of "Reader's Digest" to distill techniques
from a particular bit of code.  *grin*

I'm somewhat serious about this!  If anyone would like to point to a
particular bit of Python code that looks interesting, perhaps we can
discuss how it works on Tutor.  I'm convinced that programs should be
treated as literature.  I think the analogy to a written piece of work
does work, especially since many programs need to be rewritten and
revised... *grin*

Knuth takes this literary approach with "The Stanford Graphbase", where
source code and commentary are joined together; it's quite nice.