Python in Practice: Create Better Programs Using Concurrency, Libraries, and Patterns

by Mark Summerfield

Overview

Winner of the 2014 Jolt Award for "Best Book"

 

“Whether you are an experienced programmer or are starting your career, Python in Practice is full of valuable advice and example to help you improve your craft by thinking about problems from different perspectives, introducing tools, and detailing techniques to create more effective solutions.”

—Doug Hellmann, Senior Developer, DreamHost

 

If you’re an experienced Python programmer, Python in Practice will help you improve the quality, reliability, speed, maintainability, and usability of all your Python programs.

 

Mark Summerfield focuses on four key themes: design patterns for coding elegance, faster processing through concurrency and compiled Python (Cython), high-level networking, and graphics. He identifies well-proven design patterns that are useful in Python, illuminates them with expert-quality code, and explains why some object-oriented design patterns are irrelevant to Python. He also explodes several counterproductive myths about Python programming—showing, for example, how Python can take full advantage of multicore hardware.

 

All examples, including three complete case studies, have been tested with Python 3.3 (and, where possible, Python 3.2 and 3.1) and crafted to maintain compatibility with future Python 3.x versions. All code has been tested on Linux, and most code has also been tested on OS X and Windows. All code may be downloaded at www.qtrac.eu/pipbook.html.

 

Coverage includes

• Leveraging Python’s most effective creational, structural, and behavioral design patterns
• Supporting concurrency with Python’s multiprocessing, threading, and concurrent.futures modules
• Avoiding concurrency problems using thread-safe queues and futures rather than fragile locks
• Simplifying networking with high-level modules, including xmlrpclib and RPyC
• Accelerating Python code with Cython, C-based Python modules, profiling, and other techniques
• Creating modern-looking GUI applications with Tkinter
• Leveraging today’s powerful graphics hardware via the OpenGL API using pyglet and PyOpenGL

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780133373233
Publisher:	Pearson Education
Publication date:	08/20/2013
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	336
File size:	31 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Mark Summerfield, owner of Qtrac Ltd., is an independent trainer, consultant, technical editor, and writer specializing in C++, Go, Python, Qt, and PyQt. His books include Rapid GUI Programming with Python and Qt; C++ GUI Programming with Qt 4, Second Edition (with Jasmin Blanchette) ; Programming inPython 3, Second Edition; and Advanced Qt Programming, and Programming in Go, all from Addison-Wesley.

 

Table of Contents

Foreword       xiii

 

Introduction       1

Acknowledgments         3

 

Chapter 1:  Creational Design Patterns        5

1.1. Abstract Factory Pattern  5

1.2. Builder Pattern  11

1.3. Factory Method Pattern  17

1.4. Prototype Pattern  24

1.5. Singleton Pattern  26

 

Chapter 2:  Structural Design Patterns          29

2.1. Adapter Pattern   29

2.2. Bridge Pattern   34

2.3. Composite Pattern   40

2.4. Decorator Pattern   48

2.5. Façade Pattern    59

2.6. Flyweight Pattern    64

2.7. Proxy Pattern    67

 

Chapter 3:  Behavioral Design Patterns    73

3.1.   Chain of Responsibility Pattern   74

3.2.   Command Pattern   79

3.3.   Interpreter Pattern  83

3.4.   Iterator Pattern    95

3.5.   Mediator Pattern    100

3.6.   Memento Pattern  106

3.7.   Observer Pattern   107

3.8.   State Pattern    111

3.9.   Strategy Pattern    116

3.10. Template Method Pattern    119

3.11. Visitor Pattern    123

3.12. Case Study: An Image Package    124

 

Chapter 4: High-Level Concurrency            141

4.1. CPU-Bound Concurrency  144

4.2. I/O-Bound Concurrency    155

4.3. Case Study: A Concurrent GUI Application    164

 

Chapter 5:  Extending Python          179

5.1. Accessing C Libraries with ctypes    180

5.2. Using Cython    187

5.3. Case Study: An Accelerated Image Package    198

 

Chapter 6:  High-Level Networking              203

6.1. Writing XML-RPC Applications   204

6.2. Writing RPyC Applications     219

 

Chapter 7:  Graphical User Interfaces with Tkinter           231

7.1. Introduction to Tkinter     233

7.2. Creating Dialogs with Tkinter    235

7.3. Creating Main-Window Applications with Tkinter    253

 

Chapter 8:  OpenGL 3D Graphics            263

8.1. A Perspective Scene    264

8.2. An Orthographic Game    272

 

Appendix A:  Epilogue         283

 

Appendix B:  Selected Bibliography          285

 

Index            289