Book Image

Mastering Python 2E - Second Edition

By : Rick van Hattem
5 (1)
Book Image

Mastering Python 2E - Second Edition

5 (1)
By: Rick van Hattem

Overview of this book

Even if you find writing Python code easy, writing code that is efficient, maintainable, and reusable is not so straightforward. Many of Python’s capabilities are underutilized even by more experienced programmers. Mastering Python, Second Edition, is an authoritative guide to understanding advanced Python programming so you can write the highest quality code. This new edition has been extensively revised and updated with exercises, four new chapters and updates up to Python 3.10. Revisit important basics, including Pythonic style and syntax and functional programming. Avoid common mistakes made by programmers of all experience levels. Make smart decisions about the best testing and debugging tools to use, optimize your code’s performance across multiple machines and Python versions, and deploy often-forgotten Python features to your advantage. Get fully up to speed with asyncio and stretch the language even further by accessing C functions with simple Python calls. Finally, turn your new-and-improved code into packages and share them with the wider Python community. If you are a Python programmer wanting to improve your code quality and readability, this Python book will make you confident in writing high-quality scripts and taking on bigger challenges
Table of Contents (21 chapters)
19
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20
Index

Interactive Python Interpreters

Now that we have a working Python installation, we need to run some code. The most obvious way is to create a Python file and execute it. Often, it can be faster to interactively develop code from an interactive Python interpreter, however. While the standard Python interpreter is already quite powerful, many enhancements and alternatives are available.

The alternative interpreters/shells offer features such as:

  • Smart autocompletion
  • Syntax highlighting
  • Saving and loading sessions
  • Automatic indenting
  • Graphing/charting output

In this chapter, you will learn about:

  • Alternative interpreters:
    • bpython
    • ptpython
    • ipython
    • jupyter
  • How to enhance interpreters