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python for beginners


I've written a considerable amount of dynamic code, but until a couple of weeks ago, I was new to Python.

The APress book Dive into Python, by Mark Pilgrim, is a very good resource and will come in useful later. For now it brightens up my bookshelf with nice Halloween colors.

However, it assumes a background in Perl, which I lack. So I went on the hunt for a book that begins with the basics of Python and that speaks to my learning style. When I'm learning a programming language, I like to see things in the following order:

  1. Here's a task.

  2. Here's how this language addresses that task.

  3. And now here is the code, line for line.


O'Reilly's Programming ColdFusion MX is a fine example of this kind of instruction. So is Pilgrim's; it's just paced differently from what I need at the moment.

In my search, I found this interesting online book by Alan Gauld. It is meant as an introduction to programming for nonprogrammers, however, a programmer can read it without suffering insult. The book does not cover just one scripting language, but three: Python, JavaScript, and VBScript. Starting with the basics, it introduces a task and demonstrates how each of the three languages accomplishes this task.

I was interested only in the Python parts of the book, and it was easy to skip through the pages to just those. Within a few hours, I was working with complex data types in Python.

The book is also available for download as a tar/gzip for Linux users, a Palm doc, and a hefty 299-page pdf. I ended up printing the latter.

I just wish the author would change the name on the title page of these materials to reflect the actual name of the book rather than calling it "tutor," which is strange.

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