Re: Learning new APIs/classes (beginner question)
On Apr 7, 1:52 am, Steven D'Aprano steve +comp.lang.pyt...@pearwood.info wrote: Sounds like this library is documented the same way most third party libraries are: as an afterthought, by somebody who is so familiar with the software that he cannot imagine why anyone might actually need documentation. I feel your pain. Thanks Steven, I suspected this might be the case, but wasn't sure if I was missing something obvious. Maybe I'll start on a different project using better-documented or just the build-in libraries. Many thanks, Martin. -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Learning new APIs/classes (beginner question)
In a nutshell: My question is: how do experienced coders learn about external/third-party classes/APIs? I'm teaching myself Python through a combination of Hetland's 'Beginning Python', various online tutorials and some past experience coding ASP/VBScript. To start to learn Python I've set myself the task of coding a viewer/editor for Google Contacts and Google Calendar, mainly because I've been experiencing some synchronisation anomalies lately. This has so far entailed getting into Google's Contacts API. Although they give some examples, my searches haven't been able to pull up anything approaching comprehensive documentation on each class/method. Can anyone experienced advise on how they would usually go about learning to use third party APIs/classes like these? With thanks, Martin -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Re: Learning new APIs/classes (beginner question)
On 4/6/2012 1:41 PM Martin Jones said... In a nutshell: My question is: how do experienced coders learn about external/third-party classes/APIs? I'm teaching myself Python through a combination of Hetland's 'Beginning Python', various online tutorials and some past experience coding ASP/VBScript. One resource for learning at least the bulk of python's interal library is http://effbot/librarybook -- of course, not much help for third party libraries... Emile -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Re: Learning new APIs/classes (beginner question)
On Fri, 06 Apr 2012 13:41:23 -0700, Martin Jones wrote: In a nutshell: My question is: how do experienced coders learn about external/third-party classes/APIs? Does it have a tutorial? Do it. Does it have a manual, a wiki, FAQs, or other documentation? Read them. If all else fails, what does help(external_library) say? Are there examples you can follow? Do so. Does it have a mailing list to ask for help? Subscribe to it. Google for examples and sample code. If all else fails, read the source code if it is available. Otherwise find another library. If you can't do that, then you're stuck with learning by trial and error. Which is to say, mostly by error, which is a trial. I'm teaching myself Python through a combination of Hetland's 'Beginning Python', various online tutorials and some past experience coding ASP/VBScript. To start to learn Python I've set myself the task of coding a viewer/editor for Google Contacts and Google Calendar, mainly because I've been experiencing some synchronisation anomalies lately. This has so far entailed getting into Google's Contacts API. Although they give some examples, my searches haven't been able to pull up anything approaching comprehensive documentation on each class/method. Sounds like this library is documented the same way most third party libraries are: as an afterthought, by somebody who is so familiar with the software that he cannot imagine why anyone might actually need documentation. I feel your pain. -- Steven -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
