Category: Python
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Creating collections with “reduce”
In the first few parts of this series (first, second, and third), I introduced the “reduce” function, and showed how it can be used in a number of ways. However, in all of the examples we have seen so far, the output from our invocations of “reduce” were integers or strings. If we reduce with…
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Implementing “min” and “max” with “reduce”
This is the third installment of my “reduce” series of blog posts. For the first, see here, and for the second, see here. If you have been reading this series, then you know that “reduce” can be used to sum numbers, or to calculate scores. In that sense, “reduce” justifies its name; we’re invoking a…
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Calculating Scrabble scores with “reduce”
This is the second installment of my series of blog posts on the “reduce” function/method. For an introduction, see here. I love to play Scrabble — or more commonly nowadays, I play Words with Friends on my phone. (I often say that the game should instead be called, “Words with people who used to be your…
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Understanding “reduce” (first in a series)
One of the notable things about MIT’s computer science curriculum, at least back when I was studying there, was that you didn’t learn any “practical” programming languages. Our work was all done in either Scheme (a dialect of Lisp) or in CLU (an early object-oriented language). I can’t say that I have too many memories,…
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Benchmarking old-style and new-style Python classes
It has been many years since Python developers were really supposed to worry about new-style vs. old-style classes. There is only one style (new) in Python 3.x, and even in Python 2.x, old-style classes have not been recommended for many years. Nevertheless, I mention old-style classes in my Python courses, mostly so that participants will…
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= and = aren’t equal
When I teach a Ruby or Python class, I always begin by going through the various data types. My students are typically experienced programmers in Java, C++, or C#, and so it no longer surprises me when I begin to describe numbers, and someone asks, “How many bits is an integer?” My answer used to…
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Last call for my online Python class
You can learn more about the class here. Or contact me as “reuvenlerner” on Skype, or via e-mail at reuven@lerner.co.il, to see if it’s right for you!
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Ruby and Python and Felix and Oscar
I have been consulting, developing, and offering training classes in both Ruby and Python for a number of years now — more than 15 years in Python, and more than 7 years in Ruby. Inevitably, when someone from one of my courses hears that I use more than one language, they ask me, “So, which…
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Making Python’s __init__ method magical
In some programming languages, the idea of “reflection” is somewhat exotic, and takes a while to learn. In Python (and Ruby, for that matter), the language is both dynamic and open, allowing you to poke around in the internals of just about any object you might like. Reflection is a natural part of working with…
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Python scoping e-mail course
I had so much fun writing the previous blog post about Python scoping that I decided to expand it into a free e-mail course. Each day (for five days), you’ll receive another lesson about how scopes work in Python, and why this is important for you to know as a Python developer. So if you’ve…