Python

Python Developer's Handbook (Other Sams)

Format: Paperback
Author: Andre Lessa
ReleaseDate: 12 December, 2000
Publisher: Sams
Rating:

why is this book still in print?
5. There might be some need for a book that covers intesively py 1.2, which I think was released in 1997 or so, but aside from that, you will read about code and libraries that are no longer maintained, or even available.

Too many errors - not enough info for the number of pages
I glanced through a few pages randomly, and saw many blatant mistakes that I am surprised the author didn't catch. I was looking forward to reading another python book, but there are too many errors in the Python Developer's Handbook, for it to be useful to its intended audience. Here are some examples of mistakes caught glancing just through the first 200 pages of the book:

major mistakes
p. 105. The author gives an example of the copy module.

>>> import copy
>>> x = [1,2,3,[4,5,6]]

>>> y = copy. copy(x)

The author states here, "As you can see, this function provides the same result that y=x[:] does. It creates a new object that references the old one. If the original object is a mutable object and has its value changed, the new object will change too. "

The author's statement is totally wrong, given the example he presents. In this case, y is a copy of x, and changing either one will not change the other, as the following shows:

>>> x=[1,2,3,[4,5,6]]
>>> x

[1, 2, 3, [4, 5, 6]]
>>> y = x[:]
>>> id(x) == id(y)
0
>>> x
[1, 2, 3, [4, 5, 6]]
>>> y
[1, 2, 3, [4, 5, 6]]
>>> x. append(7)
>>> x
[1, 2, 3, [4, 5, 6], 7]
>>> y
[1, 2, 3, [4, 5, 6]]
>>>

major mistake:
p. 191. This example makes no sense at all, and surely, typing it in produces a traceback. Yet the author shows an answer he got as 2. Makes me really wonder, how many drinks did the author have while proofreading this book?

>>> def printGlobalcount():
print Globalcount. n

>>> class Counting:
n = 0
def __init__(self):
Globalcount. n = Globalcount. n + 1

>>> inc = Counting()
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "", line 1, in ?
inc = Counting()
File "", line 4, in __init__
Globalcount. n = Globalcount. n + 1
NameError: global name 'Globalcount' is not defined
>>>

more subtle mistakes:
stick with the same case, for example p. 186:

The class names are first mentioned as Student and NewStudent, but in the next few pages they change case, and mysteriously become student, and newstudent.

>>> studentfile. newstudent. __name__
'newstudent'

Final Word:

Overall, I have serious reservations about recommending this book to anyone but a proofreader. I found way too many mistakes in the initial analysis of the book for it to be very useful to any serious python programmer.

Overall Rating:

I give this book 2 stars out of 5.

Time to move on
The basic language is pretty simple, so I was looking for something that had a lot of library chapters. I bought this at a Borders store after comparing all the Python books they had in stock (they had no O'Reilly book at the time).

This fit the bill fairly well, but there are a number of frustrating things. The poor editing job to clean up the author's English is the biggest. The layout of paragragh name, content, examples is sometimes accidentally inconsistant, i. e. more poor editing.

While it covers a lot of library code in its 900+ pages, it leaves out some stuff I would use a lot. Perhaps the sections on interacting with Java and C should be in a separate book. Think of this book as something that touches on everything but needs to be augmented by more detailed books in areas of interest.

Finally, the Python 2. x information was added late in the process. That was not a big deal, as I had been writing to 1. 5 specs.

All in all, the book was worthwhile and I expect to keep using it, but I'm about to buy "Web Programming In Python" sight unseen. It's time to move on.