Python

Links

• The Python Tutorial
• Python 2.7.6 docs

• Nice example of generating / testing regex in Python (with nice / small test framework) [1]

Shell

Use iPy (ipython) to get an interactive shell with auto-completion, instant help...

%magic                    # Get help on %magic commands (%run,...)
?run                      # Get help on %run magic
%run script.py            # Run given script
%run -i script.py         # ... with inspect mode on
%run -i -e script.py      # ... ... and ignore sys.exit() call
!cmd                      # Run shell command 'cmd', for instance ...
!ls                       # ... List file in current directory

Reference

• range

Basic

for i in range(10):
    print i                      # carriage return

for i in range(10):
    print i,                     # no carriage return

Tips

Simple HTTP Server

It's very easy to setup an ad-hoc HTTP server with Python. Just open a shell in a folder with some contents to share, and type:

python -m SimpleHTTPServer

More available at http://docs.python.org/2/library/internet.html (see BaseHTTPServer and CGIHTTPServer).

Detect interactive mode

References: [2], [3]

Started with	First method	Second method	Third method
	import __main__ as main print hasattr(main, '__file__')	def in_ipython(): try: __IPYTHON__ except NameError: return False else: return True	import sys if hasattr(sys, 'ps1'): print "Running interactively." else: print "Not running interactively..." if sys.flags.interactive: print "... but I'm in interactive postmortem mode."
python mymod.py	True	-	-
python then import mymod	-	-	True
ipython mymod.py	True	True	-
ipython -i mymod.py	True	True	-
ipython then run mymod.py	True	True	-
ipython then run -i mymod.py	True	True	-
ipython then import mymod	-	True	-
ipython -i then import mymod	-	True	-

Traps

Frequent mistakes. Beware the snake can bite you!

Confuse a method and a property in a test

SOLUTION: Stick to a convention. Like always define methods like isxyyz() or hasabc() as methods. Note that defining them as property would raise an exception if used as a function, and hence might be safer.

if A.isdummy():            # This will fail isdummy is a property
if A.isdummy:              # Always True if isdummy is a method

Mix 0 with None in a sequence

Testing whether an element is defined is more difficult.

a = [0,None,None,None]
bool(a[0])           # --> False
bool(a[1])           # --> False !!! How can we tell them apart?
a[1] == None         # --> True      This works, but is unusual and likely bad practice

Mixing property and normal getter

SOLUTION: prefix all getter method with get, like getvalue()

b = a.prop           # Using a property, OR
b = a.getprop()      # Using a getter