[Tutor] nutshell review

[Alan Gauld]

> That tracks my feelings.  I don't find "Programming Python" to be very
> useful.  It's not the sort of reference book that, say, "Programming Perl"
> ....
> hasten to add, I've seen enough people swear how much they love that book,
> that this may just be idiosyncratic to me.)

One thing to note about PP is that it is really two very different books.
It was originally the second book ever published on Python and as such
tried to be both tutorial and reference and cookbook. Naturally it failed
(although not too badly or Python would probably not have taken off!) on
asll counts.

By the time the current (2nd edition) came out there were lots of Python
tutorials so this version aims at being an advanced topic guide. It looks at
lots of areas that were not very well covbered in other tutorials. It is not
a tutorial and not really a reference guide either, its probably closest to
the cookbook in spirit but less specific.

There is a 3rd edition coming out that is allegedly going to target even
more advanced topics and I have my name down with Amazon for that
one... :-)

> I think a good Python *reference* book is invaluable to any Python
> programmer.  And to me, that book is Python in a Nutshell.

Me too.

>  Python Essential Reference - When I first started playing with Python,
> ...
> The Third Edition is coming out February 24, which means it will be the
> most current Python reference book, when published.  I would be surprised
> if it didn't cover through 2.4.

According to Amazon it does... But despite opwning both of the prevbious
editions I don't think I'll be buying this one. The Nutshell is still 
current
enough for me - all the really big changes in Puython happened in 2.2!

Alan G.