‘Part One’ of the book introduces reasons for picking python as part of your programming toolkit. Its most powerful benefit across the scope is: ease of use – high on that list – which in turn increases the productivity of the developer. Still, the first chapter, embarks to show one the lay of the land – with a handful of various implementations of Python out there in the world. ANSI C, is how CPython(the main implementation) of Python is built. There is PyPy, used to speed up Python. Cython, being a way to wrap C libraries and declarations, alongside it being an extension for python into the C API.
As a beginner or a more seasoned programmer in a hurry – start with chapter one to get excited about the language. Then – to stay psyched – if you want to put that energy into good use, skip to chapter four(‘Part Two’). I finally realized why there are some bitter critics among GoodReads-reviewers pertaining this Python book, when it came to this section. Chapter two and three are essential to getting details of behind the scenes; but it can be overwhelming to some: – but, you could forgo them (2 & 3) altogether until a later time when you are more curious. Personally, I appreciated the context of the knowledge presented there more – on my second read around – and boy oh boy, am I grateful for it passionately now. Kindly remember though – there was a design choice by the author (who I respect): – so put the effort on the sequence of the book. Hence, my advice is to heed to his wisdom with the flow of the book, even when you get frustrated at times with the condensed nature of some content. It will all make sense one day, I promise.
With some serious willpower – one ought to take into account the worth of this ‘Part Three’ of the book. Most of Python programming prowess, in essence, lies in honing the crafts of expressions, statements and development to full intuition of the iteration protocol. Most tools you’ll ever come across to put in use on your career or hobby: will test your skills on the facets mastered in this section. I highly advice one to put in the work and take the time to fully comprehend the tenets in this part of the book.
Functions and generators are the nuclear power to programming that does all the heavy lifting of your software. That is where you create custom logic objects that will execute one’s own intended purposes or use other people’s functional objects. This is ‘Part IV’ of the book that I would urge you to camp on; until it penetrates your mind on how it all works. Forget if it all makes sense in the broader scope of things – though – do take all the time you need here. It’s paramount for your programming success: – especially if you’re a complete novice to this world of code.
Modules act as containers for variables, functions, classes and all other top-level script attributes. This by nature is the scope of all scopes. Where self contained programs or parts of programs are housed. Understanding its house rules in Python is a must: on your way to creating fully fledged programs. That is what ‘Part V’ is all about. It was also quite a verbose section of this book – don’t get too stack at this level for long, you’re about to conclude with OOP next on the subsequent part, that should excite you!
Classes, as you’ll encounter on ‘Part VI’ of the book are a wonder of OOP! The holy grail if you will: they will work to boost your code reusability, reduce redundancy, help manage code maintainability on sound architectures and many more other features! It’s also the most dense part of the book so far in terms of what you’ll need to know – as part of being an application based developer. So, hang in there – and fasten your seatbelt; you’re in for a long quest. Also, this is the section of the book that helps you glue together what you’ve learnt all along to start creating/learning how real world applications get put together. From how expressions and statements are chained together – to how conditional flows get implemented for abstract logic for your applicational needs. I can go on and on , but come prepared the most for ‘Part VI’ of the book, it’s essential to grasp those concepts therein to have any chance to understand Python code out there in the wild; especially with things like operator overloading, attribute fetches, abstract classes, bound methods, static/class methods and so much more! Be ready for an uphill task!
To reach on the exceptions’ section ‘Part VII’ – means you have survived the tome of learning Python programming fundamentals. The key focus to note here is how to catch errors that would otherwise crush your program. In Python, exception handling is the lightest tool you’ll come across. That makes it pretty straight forward, though it has some serious implications on the design of your future systems. Thus, noting the design decisions involved in this part of the work should be your number one priority. It will pay dividends down the line on your Python Developer career.
Lastly, the final section ‘Part VIII’ of the book augments(adds to) your understanding on managing classes or other functions. That is, ways to actually automate some of the tasks you want your programs to control. Such as attribute management, tracing, intercepting classes construction among other tools. I used to wonder when I was still a novice, how programs I ran – could come up with messages/logs along results of the code I was running… the answer will be found in this last section of the book.