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  • Early-bird pricing for Weekly Python Exercise ends today!

    Just a reminder: Registration for the advanced (B2) cohort of Weekly Python Exercise, which will begin on July 2nd, will remain open for the next two weeks. BUT early-bird pricing ($80 for 15 weeks of Python exercises, solutions, and community) ends today — Tuesday, June 18th. If you want to sharpen your Python skills, then…

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  • Understanding Python assignment

    Here’s a quick question I often ask students in my Python classes: >>> x = 100 >>> y = x >>> x = 200 After executing the above code, what is the value of y? The answer: >>> print(y)100 Many of my students, especially those with a background in C, are surprised. Didn’t we say…

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  • Reminder: Early-bird pricing for Weekly Python Exercise ends tomorrow

    This is just a quick reminder that if you want to join the advanced cohort of Weekly Python Exercise starting July 2nd, you should do it by tomorrow (Tuesday, June 18th). Don’t miss this opportunity to improve your Python coding skills! We’ll be talking about iterators, generators, decorators, threads, and functional programming, and helping you…

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  • Playing with Python strings, lists, and variable names — or, a complex answer to a simple question

    I recently received a question from a reader of my “Better developers” list. He asks: Is there any way to turn a str type into a list type? For example, I have a list of elements, and want to turn that element into a separate list. For example, if I have test = [‘a’, ‘b’,…

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  • “Python Workout” is Manning’s Deal of the Day!

    I’m a firm believer in improving your Python fluency via practice, practice, and more practice. “Python Workout” is a collection of my 50 favorite exercises from my 20 years of on-site Python training at some of the world’s largest and best-known companies. I’m delighted to announce that “Python Workout,” my book with 50 exercises to…

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  • Variables are pronouns: A simple metaphor for Python newbies

    I teach about 10 different courses to companies around the world, but my favorite remains “Python for non-programmers.” Participants in this course are typically network and system administrators, support engineers, and managers who want to learn some programming skills, but don’t see themselves as programmers. Moreover, many of them took a programming course back when…

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  • Sharpen your Python skills with Weekly Python Exercise

    It’s time for another cohort of Weekly Python Exercise! This time, it’s an advanced cohort with 15 weeks of practice in such subjects as functional programming, object-oriented programming, iterators, generators, and decorators. Early-bird pricing ends in just one week, on June 18th! Learn more, and get a sample, at https://WeeklyPythonExercise.com/.

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  • Why do Python lists let you += a tuple, when you can’t + a tuple?

    Let’s say you have a list in Python: >>> mylist = [10, 20, 30] You want to add something to that list. The most standard way to do this is with the “append” method, which adds its argument to the end of the list: >>> mylist.append(40) >>> print(mylist) [10, 20, 30, 40] But what if…

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  • Registration (and early-bird pricing) is open for Weekly Python Exercise

    Do you use Python, but sometimes feel stuck? Do you visit Stack Overflow every time you want to solve a problem? Do you wish that you understood how to use advanced techniques, such as generators and decorators, better? If so, then good news: I’m opening a new cohort of Weekly Python Exercise, specifically aimed at…

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  • Python dicts and memory usage

    Bottom line: Use sys.getsizeof to measure a dict’s memory: an empty dictionary takes 240 bytes, because it starts with eight slots ready for key-value pairs. That number reflects the structure, not the data, so it stays at 240 no matter how big your values are, growing in jumps only as you add more pairs. Let’s…

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