Core Python Applications Programming / Edition 3

by Wesley J Chun

Overview

• Already know Python but want to learn more? A lot more? Dive into a variety of topics used in practice for real-world applications.
• Covers regular expressions, Internet/network programming, GUIs, SQL/databases/ORMs, threading, and Web development.
• Learn about contemporary development trends such as Google+, Twitter, MongoDB, OAuth, Python 3 migration, and Java/Jython. Presents brand new material on Django, Google App Engine, CSV/JSON/XML, and Microsoft Office. Includes Python 2 and 3 code samples to get you started right away!
• Provides code snippets, interactive examples, and practical exercises to help build your Python skills.

The Complete Developer’s Guide to Python

Python is an agile, robust, and expressive programming language that continues to build momentum. It combines the power of compiled languages with the simplicity and rapid development of scripting languages. In Core Python Applications Programming, Third Edition , leading Python developer and corporate trainer Wesley Chun helps you take your Python knowledge to the next level.

This book has everything you need to become a versatile Python developer. You will be introduced to multiple areas of application development and gain knowledge that can be immediately applied to projects, and you will find code samples in both Python 2 and 3, including migration tips if that’s on your roadmap too. Some snippets will even run unmodified on 2.x or 3.x.

• Learn professional Python style, best practices, and good programming habits
• Build clients and servers using TCP, UDP, XML-RPC, and be exposed to higher-level libraries like SocketServer and Twisted
• Develop GUI applications using Tkinter and other available toolkits
• Improve application performance by writing extensions in C/C++, or enhance I/O-bound code with multithreading
• Discover SQL and relational databases, ORMs, and even non-relational (NonSQL) databases like MongoDB
• Learn the basics of Web programming, including Web clients and servers, plus CGI and WSGI
• Expose yourself to regular expressions and powerful text processing tools for creating and parsing CSV, JSON, and XML data
• Interface with popular Microsoft Office applications such as Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook using COM client programming
• Dive deeper into Web development with the Django framework and cloud computing with Google App Engine
• Explore Java programming with Jython, the way to run Python code on the JVM
• Connect to Web services Yahoo! Finance to get stock quotes, or Yahoo! Mail, Gmail, and others to download or send e-mail
  
• Jump into the social media craze by learning how to connect to the Twitter and Google+ networks

Core Python Applications Programming, Third Edition, delivers

• Broad coverage of a variety of areas of development used in real-world applications today
• Powerful insights into current and best practices for the intermediate Python programmer
• Dozens of code examples, from quick snippets to full-fledged applications
• A variety of exercises at the end of every chapter to help hammer the concepts home

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780132678209
Publisher:	Prentice Hall
Publication date:	03/23/2012
Series:	Core Series
Pages:	888
Product dimensions:	7.00(w) x 9.10(h) x 1.30(d)

About the Author

Wesley J. Chun is the author of the bestselling Core Python titles and the Python Fundamentals LiveLessons companion video. He is coauthor of Python Web Development with Django (withdjango.com), and has written for Linux Journal, CNET, and InformIT. In addition to being an architect and Developer Advocate at Google, he runs CyberWeb (cyberwebconsulting.com), a consulting business specializing in Python engineering and technical training. He has more than twenty-five years of programming, teaching, and writing experience, including more than a decade of Python. While at Yahoo!, he helped create Yahoo! Mail and Yahoo! People Search using Python. He holds degrees in computer science, mathematics, and music from the University of California.

Table of Contents

Preface xv

Acknowledgments xxvii

About the Author xxxi

Part I: General Application Topics 1

Chapter 1: Regular Expressions 2

1.1 Introduction/Motivation 3

1.2 Special Symbols and Characters 6

1.3 Regexes and Python 16

1.4 Some Regex Examples 36

1.5 A Longer Regex Example 41

1.6 Exercises 48

Chapter 2: Network Programming 53

2.1 Introduction 54

2.2 What Is Client/Server Architecture? 54

2.3 Sockets: Communication Endpoints 58

2.4 Network Programming in Python 61

2.5 The SocketServer Module 79

2.6 Introduction to the Twisted Framework 84

2.7 Related Modules 88

2.8 Exercises 89

Chapter 3: Internet Client Programming 94

3.1 What Are Internet Clients? 95

3.2 Transferring Files 96

3.3 Network News 104

3.4 E-Mail 114

3.5 Related Modules 146

3.6 Exercises 148

Chapter 4: Multithreaded Programming 156

4.1 Introduction/Motivation 157

4.2 Threads and Processes 158

4.3 Threads and Python 160

4.4 The thread Module 164

4.5 The threading Module 169

4.6 Comparing Single vs. Multithreaded Execution 180

4.7 Multithreading in Practice 182

4.8 Producer-Consumer Problem and the Queue/queue Module 202

4.9 Alternative Considerations to Threads 206

4.10 Related Modules 209

4.11 Exercises 210

Chapter 5: GUI Programming 213

5.1 Introduction 214

5.2 Tkinter and Python Programming 216

5.3 Tkinter Examples 221

5.4 A Brief Tour of Other GUIs 236

5.5 Related Modules and Other GUIs 247

5.6 Exercises 250

Chapter 6: Database Programming 253

6.1 Introduction 254

6.2 The Python DB-API 259

6.3 ORMs 289

6.4 Non-Relational Databases 309

6.5 Related References 316

6.6 Exercises 319

Chapter 7: Programming Microsoft Office 324

7.1 Introduction 325

7.2 COM Client Programming with Python 326

7.3 Introductory Examples 328

7.4 Intermediate Examples 338

7.5 Related Modules/Packages 357

7.6 Exercises 357

Chapter 8: Extending Python 364

8.1 Introduction/Motivation 365

8.2 Extending Python by Writing Extensions 368

8.3 Related Topics 384

8.4 Exercises 388

Part II: Web Development 389

Chapter 9: Web Clients and Servers 390

9.1 Introduction 391

9.2 Python Web Client Tools 396

9.3 Web Clients 410

9.4 Web (HTTP) Servers 428

9.5 Related Modules 433

9.6 Exercises 436

Chapter 10: Web Programming: CGI and WSGI 441

10.1 Introduction 442

10.2 Helping Web Servers Process Client Data 442

10.3 Building CGI Applications 446

10.4 Using Unicode with CGI 464

10.5 Advanced CGI 466

10.6 Introduction to WSGI 478

10.7 Real-World Web Development 487

10.8 Related Modules 488

10.9 Exercises 490

Chapter 11: Web Frameworks: Django 493

11.1 Introduction 494

11.2 Web Frameworks 494

11.3 Introduction to Django 496

11.4 Projects and Apps 501

11.5 Your “Hello World” Application (A Blog) 507

11.6 Creating a Model to Add Database Service 509

11.7 The Python Application Shell 514

11.8 The Django Administration App 518

11.9 Creating the Blog’s User Interface 527

11.10 Improving the Output 537

11.11 Working with User Input 542

11.12 Forms and Model Forms 546

11.13 More About Views 551

11.14 Look-and-Feel Improvements 553

11.15 Unit Testing 554

11.16 An Intermediate Django App: The TweetApprover 564

11.17 Resources 597

11.18 Conclusion 597

11.19 Exercises 598

Chapter 12: Cloud Computing: Google App Engine 604

12.1 Introduction 605

12.2 What Is Cloud Computing? 605

12.3 The Sandbox and the App Engine SDK 612

12.4 Choosing an App Engine Framework 617

12.5 Python 2.7 Support 626

12.6 Comparisons to Django 628

12.7 Morphing “Hello World” into a Simple Blog 631

12.8 Adding Memcache Service 647

12.9 Static Files 651

12.10 Adding Users Service 652

12.11 Remote API Shell 654

12.12 Lightning Round (with Python Code) 656

12.13 Sending Instant Messages by Using XMPP 660

12.14 Processing Images 662

12.15 Task Queues (Unscheduled Tasks) 663

12.16 Profiling with Appstats 670

12.17 The URLfetch Service 672

12.18 Lightning Round (without Python Code) 673

12.19 Vendor Lock-In 675

12.20 Resources 676

12.21 Conclusion 679

12.22 Exercises 680

Chapter 13: Web Services 684

13.1 Introduction 685

13.2 The Yahoo! Finance Stock Quote Server 685

13.3 Microblogging with Twitter 690

13.4 Exercises 707

Part III: Supplemental/Experimental 713

Chapter 14: Text Processing 714

14.1 Comma-Separated Values 715

14.2 JavaScript Object Notation 719

14.3 Extensible Markup Language 724

14.4 References 738

14.5 Related Modules 740

14.6 Exercises 740

Chapter 15: Miscellaneous 743

15.1 Jython 744

15.2 Google+ 748

15.3 Exercises 759

Appendix A: Answers to Selected Exercises 763

Appendix B: Reference Tables 768

Appendix C: Python 3: The Evolution of a Programming Language 798

C.1 Why Is Python Changing? 799

C.2 What Has Changed? 799

C.3 Migration Tools 805

C.4 Conclusion 806

C.5 References 806

Appendix D: Python 3 Migration with 2.6+ 807

D.1 Python 3: The Next Generation 807

D.2 Integers 809

D.3 Built-In Functions 812

D.4 Object-Oriented Programming: Two Different Class Objects 814

D.5 Strings 815

D.6 Exceptions 816

D.7 Other Transition Tools and Tips 817

D.8 Writing Code That is Compatible in Both Versions 2.x and 3.x 818

D.9 Conclusion 822

Index 823