Mastering Python Programming

Part 1: An overview of Python

1. What is python?
2. Python Timeline
3. Advantages/Disadvantages of Python
4. Getting help with pydoc

Part 2: The Python Environment

1. Starting Python
2. Using the interpreter
3. Running a Python script
4. Python scripts on Unix/Windows
5. Editors and IDEs

Part 3: Getting Started

1. Using variables
2. Builtin functions
3. Strings
4. Numbers
5. Converting among types
6. Writing to the screen
7. Command line parameters

Part 4: Flow Control

1. About flow control
2. White space
3. Conditional expressions
4. Relational and Boolean operators
5. While loops
6. Alternate loop exits

Part 5: Array types

1. About array types (AKA sequences)
2. Lists and list methods
3. Tuples
4. Indexing and slicing
5. Iterating through a sequence
6. Nested sequences
7. Sequence functions, keywords, and operators
8. List comprehensions
9. Generator Expressions

Part 6: Working with files

1. File overview
2. Opening a text file
3. Reading a text file
4. Writing to a text file
5. Reading and writing raw (binary) data
6. Converting binary data with struct

Part 7: Dictionaries and Sets

1. About dictionaries
2. Creating dictionaries
3. Iterating through a dictionary
4. About sets
5. Creating sets
6. Working with sets

Part 8: Functions

1. Defining functions
2. Parameters 
3. Global and local scope
4. Nested functions
5. Returning values

Part 9: Sorting

1. The sorted() function
2. Alternate keys
3. Lambda functions
4. Sorting collections
5. Using operator.itemgetter()
6. Reverse sorting

Part 10: Errors and Exception Handling

1. Syntax errors
2. Exceptions
3. Using try/catch/else/finally
4. Handling multiple exceptions
5. Ignoring exceptions

Part 11:  Modules and Packages

1. The import statement
2. Module search path
3. Creating Modules
4. Using packages
5. Function and Module aliases

Part 12: Classes

1. About o-o programming
2. Defining classes
3. Constructors
4. Methods
5. Instance data
6. Properties
7. Class methods and data

Part 13: Regular Expressions

1. RE syntax overview
2. RE Objects
3. Searching and matching
4. Compilation flags
5. Groups and special groups
6. Replacing text
7. Splitting strings

Part 14:  The standard library

1. The sys module
2. Launching external programs
3. Math functions
4. Random numbers
5. Reading CSV data

Part 15:  Dates and times

1. Working with dates and times
2. Translating timestamps
3. Parsing dates from text
4. Formatting dates
5. Calendar data

Part 16:  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. Creating filters with fileinput
6. Using shutil for file operations

Part 17:  Advanced data handling

1. Defaultdict and Counter
2. Prettyprinting data structures
3. Compressed archives (zip, gzip, tar, etc.)
4. Persistent data

Part 18:  Network programming

1. Using requests
2. Grabbing web content
3. Sending email
4. Using SSH for remote access
5. Using FTP

Part 19: Writing real-life applications

1. Reading input files a la Unix
2. Parsing command-line options
3. Detecting the current platform
4. Implementing logging

• Experienced users who want to use Python in web development projects
• System administrators and web site administrators who want to use Python to support their server installations
• Anyone else who wants to automate or simplify common tasks with the use of Python scripts.
• Basic familiarity with any programming or scripting language would be helpful, along with a working, user-level knowledge of Unix/Linux, Mac, or Windows.

• Create working Python scripts following best practices
• Use python data types appropriately
• Read and write files with both text and binary data
• Search and replace text with regular expressions
• Get familiar with the standard library and its work-saving modules
• Use lesser known but powerful Python data types
• Create "real-world", professional Python applications
• Work with dates, times, and calendars
• Know when to use collections such as lists, dictionaries, and sets
• Understand Pythonic features such as comprehensions and iterators