Beyond the Basic Stuff with Python

BRIDGE THE GAP BETWEEN NOVICE AND PROFESSIONAL

Youve completed a basic Python programming tutorial or finished Al Sweigarts bestseller, Automate the Boring Stuff with Python. Whats the next step toward becoming a capable, confident software developer?

Welcome to Beyond the Basic Stuff with Python. More than a mere collection of advanced syntax and masterful tips for writing clean code, youll learn how to advance your Python programming skills by using the command line and other professional tools like code formatters, type checkers, linters, and version control. Sweigart takes you through best practices for setting up your development environment, naming variables, and improving readability, then tackles documentation, organization and performance measurement, as well as object-oriented design and the Big-O algorithm analysis commonly used in coding interviews. The skills you learn will boost your ability to program--not just in Python but in any language.

Youll learn:
Coding style, and how to use Pythons Black auto-formatting tool for cleaner code Common sources of bugs, and how to detect them with static analyzers How to structure the files in your code projects with the Cookiecutter template tool Functional programming techniques like lambda and higher-order functions How to profile the speed of your code with Pythons built-in timeit and cProfile modules The computer science behind Big-O algorithm analysis How to make your comments and docstrings informative, and how often to write them How to create classes in object-oriented programming, and why theyre used to organize code
Toward the end of the book youll read a detailed source-code breakdown of two classic command-line games, the Tower of Hanoi (a logic puzzle) and Four-in-a-Row (a two-player tile-dropping game), and a breakdown of how their code follows the books best practices. Youll test your skills by implementing the program yourself.

Of course, no single book can make you a professional software developer. But Beyond the Basic Stuff with Python will get you further down that path and make you a better programmer, as you learn to write readable code thats easy to debug and perfectly Pythonic

Requirements: Covers Python 3.6 and higher