Table of Contents

• 1. Installing Python
  • 1.1. Which Python is right for you?
  • 1.2. Python on Windows
  • 1.3. Python on Mac OS X
  • 1.4. Python on Mac OS 9
  • 1.5. Python on RedHat Linux
  • 1.6. Python on Debian GNU/Linux
  • 1.7. Installing from source
  • 1.8. The interactive shell
  • 1.9. Summary
• 2. Getting To Know Python
  • 2.1. Diving in
  • 2.2. Declaring functions
  • 2.3. Documenting functions
  • 2.4. Everything is an object
  • 2.5. Indenting code
  • 2.6. Testing modules
  • 2.7. Introducing dictionaries
  • 2.8. Introducing lists
  • 2.9. Introducing tuples
  • 2.10. Declaring variables
  • 2.11. Assigning multiple values at once
  • 2.12. Formatting strings
  • 2.13. Mapping lists
  • 2.14. Joining lists and splitting strings
  • 2.15. Summary
• 3. The Power Of Introspection
  • 3.1. Diving in
  • 3.2. Optional and named arguments
  • 3.3. type, str, dir, and other built-in functions
  • 3.4. Getting object references with getattr
  • 3.5. Filtering lists
  • 3.6. The peculiar nature of and and or
  • 3.7. Using lambda functions
  • 3.8. Putting it all together
  • 3.9. Summary
• 4. An Object-Oriented Framework
  • 4.1. Diving in
  • 4.2. Importing modules using from module import
  • 4.3. Defining classes
  • 4.4. Instantiating classes
  • 4.5. UserDict: a wrapper class
  • 4.6. Special class methods
  • 4.7. Advanced special class methods
  • 4.8. Class attributes
  • 4.9. Private functions
  • 4.10. Handling exceptions
  • 4.11. File objects
  • 4.12. for loops
  • 4.13. More on modules
  • 4.14. The os module
  • 4.15. Putting it all together
  • 4.16. Summary
• 5. HTML Processing
  • 5.1. Diving in
  • 5.2. Introducing sgmllib.py
  • 5.3. Extracting data from HTML documents
  • 5.4. Introducing BaseHTMLProcessor.py
  • 5.5. locals and globals
  • 5.6. Dictionary-based string formatting
  • 5.7. Quoting attribute values
  • 5.8. Introducing dialect.py
  • 5.9. Introducing regular expressions
  • 5.10. Putting it all together
  • 5.11. Summary
• 6. XML Processing
  • 6.1. Diving in
  • 6.2. Packages
  • 6.3. Parsing XML
  • 6.4. Unicode
  • 6.5. Searching for elements
  • 6.6. Accessing element attributes
  • 6.7. Abstracting input sources
  • 6.8. Standard input, output, and error
  • 6.9. Caching node lookups
  • 6.10. Finding direct children of a node
  • 6.11. Creating separate handlers by node type
  • 6.12. Handling command line arguments
  • 6.13. Putting it all together
  • 6.14. Summary
• 7. Unit Testing
  • 7.1. Diving in
  • 7.2. Introducing romantest.py
  • 7.3. Testing for success
  • 7.4. Testing for failure
  • 7.5. Testing for sanity
  • 7.6. roman.py, stage 1
  • 7.7. roman.py, stage 2
  • 7.8. roman.py, stage 3
  • 7.9. roman.py, stage 4
  • 7.10. roman.py, stage 5
  • 7.11. Handling bugs
  • 7.12. Handling changing requirements
  • 7.13. Refactoring
  • 7.14. Postscript
  • 7.15. Summary
• 8. Regression Testing
  • 8.1. Diving in
  • 8.2. Finding the path
  • 8.3. Filtering lists revisited
  • 8.4. Mapping lists revisited
  • 8.5. Data-centric programming
  • 8.6. Dynamically importing modules
  • 8.7. Putting it all together (part 1)
  • 8.8. Inside PyUnit
• A. Further reading
• B. A 5-minute review
• C. Tips and tricks
• D. List of examples
• E. Revision history
• F. About the book
• G. GNU Free Documentation License
  • G.0. Preamble
  • G.1. Applicability and definitions
  • G.2. Verbatim copying
  • G.3. Copying in quantity
  • G.4. Modifications
  • G.5. Combining documents
  • G.6. Collections of documents
  • G.7. Aggregation with independent works
  • G.8. Translation
  • G.9. Termination
  • G.10. Future revisions of this license
  • G.11. How to use this License for your documents
• H. Python 2.1.1 license
  • H.A. History of the software
  • H.B. Terms and conditions for accessing or otherwise using Python
    • H.B.1. PSF license agreement
    • H.B.2. BeOpen Python open source license agreement version 1
    • H.B.3. CNRI open source GPL-compatible license agreement
    • H.B.4. CWI permissions statement and disclaimer