The Python Environment

1. Starting Python

2. Using the interpreter

3. Running a Python script

4. Editors and IDEs

Variables and Values

1. Using variables

2. Builtin functions

3. String data

4. Numeric data

5. Converting types

Basic input and output

1. Writing to the screen

2. String formatting

3. Command line arguments

4. Reading the keyboard

Flow Control

1. About flow control

2. The if statement

3. Relational and Boolean values

4. while loops

5. Exiting from loops

Array types

1. Sequence types in general

2. Lists and list methods

3. Tuples

4. Indexing and slicing

5. Iterating through a sequence

6. Sequence functions, keywords, and operators

7. List comprehensions and generators

Working with files

1. File I/O overview

2. Opening a text file

3. Reading a text file

4. Writing to a text file

Dictionaries and Sets

1. About dictionaries

2. Creating dictionaries

3. Getting values

4. Iterating through a dictionary

5. About sets

6. Creating sets

7. Working with sets

Functions

1. Defining functions

2. Returning values

3. Parameters and arguments

4. Variable scope

Sorting

1. The sorted() function

2. Custom sort keys

3. Lambda functions

4. Sorting in reverse

5. Using min() and max()

Exception handling and logging

1. Exceptions

2. Using try/catch/else/finally

3. Handling multiple exceptions

4. Logging setup

5. Basic logging

Modules and Packages

1. Creating Modules

2. The import statement

3. Module search path

4. Using packages

5. Function and Module aliases

Introduction to Classes

1. About object-oriented programming

2. Defining classes

3. Constructors

4. Understanding self

5. Properties

6. Instance Methods and data

7. Class methods and data

8. Inheritance

Regular Expressions

1. RE syntax overview

2. RE objects

3. Searching and matching

4. Compilation flags

5. Groups and special groups

6. Search-and-replace

7. Splitting strings

Dates and times

1. Date and time representations

2. Parsing dates from text

3. Formatting as text

4. Converting representations

5. Calendar data

6. Time zones

Working with the file system

1. Paths, directories, and filenames

2. Checking for existence

3. Permissions and other file attributes

4. Walking directory trees

5. Using shutil for file operations

Advanced data handling

1. Defaultdict and Counter

2. Pretty-printing data structures

3. Compressed archives (zip, gzip, tar, etc.)

4. Persistent data

Network programming

1. Using requests

2. Grabbing web content

3. Sending email

4. Using SSH for remote access

5. Using FTP

Effective Scripts

1. Reading input files a la Unix

2. Parsing command-line options

3. Detecting the current platform

4. Implementing logging

Virtual Environments

1. Why are virtual environments needed

2. Creating a virtual env

3. Replicating an environment

4. Virtual environment issues

Addendum & Resources