Python Standard Library is an essential guide for serious Python programmers. Python is a modular language that imports most useful operations from the standard library (basic support modules; operating system interfaces; network protocols; file formats; data conversions; threads and processes; and data storage). You can't really program in Python without using it. In this book, author Fredrik Lundh, creator of the Python Imaging Library (PIL), delivers tested, accurate documentation of all the modules in the Python Standard Library, along with over 300 annotated example scripts using the modules.Python Standard Library renders this valuable information in a clean, easy-to-read format, yet doesn't talk down to readers. This accurate and complete reference documentation is for the Python programmer who wants the facts and little else.The book is based on the author's work with the Python newsgroup: he reviewed more than 2500 questions and answers to that newsgroup in order to make sure the book covered what Python users really wanted to know. An earlier version of this book has been available electronically for over a year, so the material has been tested by Python programmers in real-life applications.This version of Python Standard Library covers all the new modules and related information for Python 2.0, the first new major release of Python in four years.
Ideal for any working Python developer, Fredik Lundh's
Python Standard Library provides an excellent tour of some of the most important modules in today's Python 2.0 standard. Mixing sample code and plenty of expert advice, this title will be indispensable for programmers.
The book presents sample script code for almost 200 of the built-in modules in Python 2.0--written by a frequent contributor to Python newsgroups--and shows how to solve common programming problems in Python. Instead of a function-based reference, you get sample scripts for a wide variety of solutions centring on different Python modules.
Early sections look at core modules for working with the operating system, maths and strings, among other functions. Material on Python's excellent support for files and directories will help you master the file system. Explanations of various encryption schemes will let you add security to your Python scripts.
Getting Python to multitask with multiple threads comes next, along with getting Python programs to communicate using pipes and signals. After sample scripts for "pickling" Python objects to and from files, the book delves into modules that are geared toward today's Internet. First, there's coverage of Python's support for XML, HTML and SGML, followed by a discussion of its extensive networking support for low-level sockets to high-level Internet protocols, including e-mail and FTP. Sample scripts for e-mail will be really useful for any Python programmer.
Later chapters provide coverage of internationalisation support in Python and its support for multimedia. The book closes with material on platform-specific modules (which are specific to Unix and/or Windows) as well as modules that are obsolete but necessary to understanding legacy Python code.
There's a lot of expertise on display in Python Standard Library. The code does much of the talking in this example-packed text, which is sure to earn its place on any working Python programmer's bookshelf. --Richard Dragan
Topics covered:
- introduction to the Python 2.0 standard modules
- core modules (including modules for operating system functions, string, maths and time)
- file and directory modules
- encryption and security modules
- threads, processes, pipes and signals in Python
- persisting Python objects (marshalling and "pickling" objects)
- Python modules for XML, HTML and SGML
- modules for e-mail and news support
- Internet programming with Python (including sockets, a chat example, FTP, SMTP, IMAP, POP and Telnet)
- internationalisation support
- mmmodules for multimedia support (image and sound files)
- data storage in Python (with shelves)
- Python tools
- platform-specific modules (including Unix- and Windows-specific modules)
- miscellaneous and legacy Python modules
