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The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python: Best Practices for Development
The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python takes the journeyman Pythonista to true expertise. More than any other language, Python was created with the philosophy of simplicity and parsimony. Now 25 years old, Python has become the primary or secondary language (after SQL) for many business users. With popularity comes diversityâ??and possibly dilution. This guide, collaboratively written by over a hundred members of the Python community, describes best practices currently used by package and application developers. Unlike other books for this audience, The Hitchhikerâ??s Guide is light on reusable code and heavier on design philosophy, directing the reader to excellent sources that already exist.
338 pages, Paperback
Published October 4, 2016
152 people are currently reading
424 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews
April 4, 2017
I really wish there were more books like this: a solid, thorough overview of the landscape for the Python programming language. I'd almost be tempted to write one for Scala (...if I only had the time). If you're already semi-comfortable with Python and just want to know how to get things done, this is a great resource. Don't expect anything terribly deep here, though. If that's your goal, look elsewhere.
March 31, 2017
Practical no fluff guide to using Python. This is a consolidated source of best practices around writing, reading and shipping great code. The author's work should be very familiar to anyone using the ubiquitous 'requests' library and this book does not disappoint. There are also excellent links throughout the chapters for further research.
February 9, 2017
A good overview of modern Python. You can skim this if you already know lots of Python and still get lots of new information.
December 5, 2016
A fantastic compendium of the latest and greatest in the Python ecosystem in the present day - and I thought I knew Python! The case studies on libraries like Werkzeug and Requests, as well as the descriptions of ORMs, were occasionally a little difficult to digest, but that doesn't take away from the points that the book is trying to make. I liked the usage of the Python debugger (pdb), which I didn't know much about at all, to explore the Flask codebase. The packaging and pip's details, as well as the listing of libraries for various scenarios were invaluable. There is occasionally some weird phrasing, which can be fixed in future edits. Since I continue using Python, I see myself coming back to this book for reference on the latest and greatest on good structure, style, packaging, documentation, testing, performance and compilation (Cython and Numba), etc. tools out there. Expands one's reading list as well because it links to a lot of external articles. Also does a great job of highlighting which particular Zen of Python a given library or framework is exemplifying. The book is very dense in the number of links and libraries it provides information on. I wouldn't recommend it to a beginner - just the sheer number of recommendations from the book can be overwhelming, but if you're a full time software developer using even a modicum of Python in your day job, it's a must read.
February 6, 2018
This book does a good job explaining the tooling ecosystem around Python as well as some best practices for writing Python code. Learning the language itself is a re-requisite and a this is not a beginner's book.
My primary complaint is that a quite large section of the book is devoted to code reading, and in particularly explaining various patterns in popular Python codebases. When learning a new language I frequently do this myself by pulling down repositories from "awesome [language name]" GitHub pages and exploring how various expert developers craft their code in the language. I felt it was unnecessary and overdone to be going through this exercise as part of a book, resulting in overly-wordy explanations. Take this section out of the book, and take also the "Part III: Scenario Guide" section, and there's just not that much content here.
Although I haven't read it yet, I guess I was looking for more focus on best practices, Python idioms, discussions of the ecosystem, etc. that I perhaps will find in the book "Fluent Python", which I am reading next.
Still, this is not a bad book to get a pulse on the state of the ecosystem and some tooling choices. I just left wanting a bit more out of this book overall.
My primary complaint is that a quite large section of the book is devoted to code reading, and in particularly explaining various patterns in popular Python codebases. When learning a new language I frequently do this myself by pulling down repositories from "awesome [language name]" GitHub pages and exploring how various expert developers craft their code in the language. I felt it was unnecessary and overdone to be going through this exercise as part of a book, resulting in overly-wordy explanations. Take this section out of the book, and take also the "Part III: Scenario Guide" section, and there's just not that much content here.
Although I haven't read it yet, I guess I was looking for more focus on best practices, Python idioms, discussions of the ecosystem, etc. that I perhaps will find in the book "Fluent Python", which I am reading next.
Still, this is not a bad book to get a pulse on the state of the ecosystem and some tooling choices. I just left wanting a bit more out of this book overall.
February 14, 2017
This is a really informative book about the python ecosystem. A lot of books tell you how the language works and then tell you that you can import libraries to do a lot of stuff for you. Other books will tell you about one or two of those libraries. This book tells you about like 10 libraries that you can choose from in each different problem domain, and then talks briefly about each one. This book is full of very useful information for people who are ready to move beyond how the language basically works.
October 5, 2016
Excellent reference material. It has a lot of outbound links, and you can spend days just recursively following them. Rather than being the ultimate goto for Python knowledge, it connects you to useful tools and learning resources.
November 30, 2017
This is a very nice book, to look frequently for the best practices involved in python programming, It also gives lots of insights how to create and distribute python modules.
Books also provide useful insights on the various tasks we can perform using python like Web Development, Cryptography, AI. People can refer this book before proceeding to program in python.
Books also provide useful insights on the various tasks we can perform using python like Web Development, Cryptography, AI. People can refer this book before proceeding to program in python.
January 19, 2018
Excellent overview of all aspects of Python programming language. Good starting point for beginners and up to intermediate level. More a reference guide on style and also awareness of available packages. Use it as a springboard to go to other branches within Python. Nice references at the end. Highly recommend.
July 25, 2020
I read this book too early to be honest, but if I needed any of these information, I know where to look now.
Plenty of information about different libraries, packages and tips, and at the end of the book plenty of resources for beginners and advanced users.
Plenty of information about different libraries, packages and tips, and at the end of the book plenty of resources for beginners and advanced users.
March 8, 2018
Being close to 2 years old, it's slightly dated, but still valid enough to be a great resource
November 8, 2019
Was a good overview of the language and ways to accomplish common things. In my Kindle version, a lot of the code was hard to read so that's why I'm docking a star.
Currently reading
April 26, 2020Read it on-line
June 7, 2020
Great overview for the Python ecosystem:)!
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August 25, 2023читайте на английском, на русском очень много косяков
December 17, 2023
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January 15, 2017
Amazingly well written. Goes deep into Python in a very practical way.
March 8, 2020
Good book and easy read.
July 9, 2017
This book is intended for intermediate python devs to hone their python skills.
Part 1 provides a good overview about various ways one can bootstrap python environment. It covers differences between Py2 and Py3 along with various python interpreters, IDEs, and virtual environments.
Part 2 focuses on writing, reading, and shipping great python code. This involves a list of good practices and then studying these practices in real-world python projects. It has loads of good advice about writing good python code. In the chapter on shipping great code, I learned that one could create executable zip files containing python code :) The chapter on reading code will probably take most effort as one has to grok the code while reading.
Part 3 glosses over numerous python libraries/frameworks focused on capabilities such as data persistence, data manipulation, web, CLI, and performance. This part is more of a reference than an end-to-end read.
I'd recommend it for intermediate python devs.
Part 1 provides a good overview about various ways one can bootstrap python environment. It covers differences between Py2 and Py3 along with various python interpreters, IDEs, and virtual environments.
Part 2 focuses on writing, reading, and shipping great python code. This involves a list of good practices and then studying these practices in real-world python projects. It has loads of good advice about writing good python code. In the chapter on shipping great code, I learned that one could create executable zip files containing python code :) The chapter on reading code will probably take most effort as one has to grok the code while reading.
Part 3 glosses over numerous python libraries/frameworks focused on capabilities such as data persistence, data manipulation, web, CLI, and performance. This part is more of a reference than an end-to-end read.
I'd recommend it for intermediate python devs.
October 4, 2016
Not an upgrade over the original guide available at .
I am really not a fan of guides printed as books just for the sake of having them as books.
This is not a viable solution long term and even short term due to the ever-updating nature of "The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python". By the time your printed copy has arrived, you'll be already behind significantly.
I am still a big fan of Kenneth Reitz, but I wish a man with his great experience would write a more unique and technical-oriented book.
I am really not a fan of guides printed as books just for the sake of having them as books.
This is not a viable solution long term and even short term due to the ever-updating nature of "The Hitchhiker's Guide to Python". By the time your printed copy has arrived, you'll be already behind significantly.
I am still a big fan of Kenneth Reitz, but I wish a man with his great experience would write a more unique and technical-oriented book.
December 14, 2017
Читать было интересно и о времени/деньгах не жалею совсем. Но всё таки странная книга в итоге. Для справочника слишком общая, для обзорной книге по подходам иногда становится скучно читать именно описания библиотек. Но с другой стороны теперь я знаю где можно посмотреть например хорошее описание методов упаковки пакетов.
Тем кто уже пишет на Питоне всё таки рекомендую ознакомится!
Тем кто уже пишет на Питоне всё таки рекомендую ознакомится!
Want to read
August 24, 2017Found this at the library over the weekend. Seems like a good book.
Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews
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