Book Image

Modular Programming with Python

By : Erik Westra
Book Image

Modular Programming with Python

By: Erik Westra

Overview of this book

Python has evolved over the years and has become the primary choice of developers in various fields. The purpose of this book is to help readers develop readable, reliable, and maintainable programs in Python. Starting with an introduction to the concept of modules and packages, this book shows how you can use these building blocks to organize a complex program into logical parts and make sure those parts are working correctly together. Using clearly written, real-world examples, this book demonstrates how you can use modular techniques to build better programs. A number of common modular programming patterns are covered, including divide-and-conquer, abstraction, encapsulation, wrappers and extensibility. You will also learn how to test your modules and packages, how to prepare your code for sharing with other people, and how to publish your modules and packages on GitHub and the Python Package Index so that other people can use them. Finally, you will learn how to use modular design techniques to be a more effective programmer.
Table of Contents (16 chapters)
Modular Programming with Python
Credits
About the Author
About the Reviewer
www.PacktPub.com
Preface
Index

Package data


A package might contain more than just Python source files. Sometimes, you might need to include other types of files as well. For example, a package may include one or more image files, a large text file containing a list of all the ZIP codes in the USA, or any other type of data you may need. If you can store something in a file, you can include this file as part of your Python package.

Normally, you would place your package data in a separate sub-directory within the package directory. To access these files, your package needs to know where to find this sub-directory. While you could hardwire the location of this directory into your package, this won't work if your package is to be reused or moved. It's also not necessary as you can easily find the directory in which a module resides by using the following code:

cur_dir = os.path.abspath(os.path.dirname(__file__))

This gives you the complete path to the directory containing the current module. Using the os.path.join() function...