Comments about O'Reilly Media Head First Python:

After stumbling across multiple python books, none of which could motivate me from switching to this-programming-language-without-curly-braces-and-semicolons (blasphemy!) aka python, i knew if there ever was going to be a way i was going to like python, it would be through HF python. And i am very glad to say i was not disappointed. HF python is an excellent resource for beginners, who want to quickly get their hands dirty at writing cheap, dirty scripts and make things work. The graphical, interactive way of HF books needs no description, of course -- you just have to buy one to experience a totally different way of teaching that is so characteristic of HF books!
On the whole, this book does a very good job of giving the reader a quick and easy way to start learning python. I totally recommend it to anybody who has a little background into programming and wants to dive right into python - head first.

Comments about O'Reilly Media Head First Python:

I have been a great fan of Head first books. I learnt a lot from Head first Java, OOAD. Though I am a professional, I even went on to read head first Programming, for the way they do it. But I am thoroughly disappointed with the Head first python. It is not just waste of money, it is also waste of time. It didnt even cover the core concepts. So many things are left over. Also the examples are no where near interesting. The *AHA* factor is missing. Head first Programming is much better than this. The only drawback of that is that it didnt cover OOPS concepts. My opinion is that Head first Programming could have been revised to include the OOP. This is an unnecessary book. Eagerly awaiting to see how is Head First C

Comments about O'Reilly Media Head First Python:

This is the fourth Head First book I've used, and I really like the series. This book is a great primer to Python, but it doesn't even scratch the surface of everything you can do with it. It is an incredible improvement over Head First Programming, in that new information is never introduced in solutions to the problems, as was the case in almost every single problem in Head First Programming, to the point where a non-programmer could not have possibly solved any of them without foreknowledge of Python.

The pacing is good, not so slow as to become boring, but not too quick for a neophyte (me).

It doesn't cover use of tkinter at all, or GUIs in any capacity, which is a little bit of a bummer, but HF Programming has a few good chapters on that.

My primary beef with this book must be prefaced by the fact that it is around fifty dollars in a book store, and upwards of thirty from good online book stores.

The spelling errors in this book are so frequent that, to quote Kevin Murphy, "We're already in Monty Python territory" by chapter 3. This wouldn't be much of a problem except that some of these errors are found in explanatory passages and example code, and if one with no knowledge of Python were to read them, they would start running into all kinds of value errors and other exceptions when the following page has a celebratory picture on it declaring how well the program works.

Spelling errors really should be picked up by editing, especially when these books come at such a premium, but contextual and informational errors really make this into a serious problem that is more than just a pet peeve.

Unless this is a new approach for Head First (using erroneous information to make you look at other sources to find the answer, thereby making you angry, causing you to remember the information better), this book seriously needs some fixing to be worth its price.

Again, I liked the book, but I'm a little turned off by the fact that nobody went over anything in it before it went to the press.

Comments about O'Reilly Media Head First Python:

Head First Python by Paul Barry

Overall I highly recommend this book. If you want to learn Python, but is not interested in web development, don't worry, just don't read chapters 7, 8, 10 and 11 ;-)

Chapter 1:

There are no instructions on how to install Python. I'll suggest to give specific instructions on how to install Python on every OS, and don't mean installing from the binaries, but from the source.

The rest of chapter 1 is great. Have a LOT of dense material.

Chapter 2:

Great chapter with lots of details and new things to learn. The more a read, the more I love this book. Although is very dense, explains everything very simple, with excellent examples.

Chapter 3:

The only thing I would add to this chapter is the following link:

http://docs.python.org/library/exceptions.html

which has all the exceptions of python.

Chapter 4:

Just add the following example in the use of pickle:

import pickle

fileName = 'path/mydata.pickle'

with open(fileName, 'wb') as mysavedata:

pickle.dump([1, 2, 'three'], mysavedata)
pickle.dump('this is a string line', mysavedata, -1)
pickle.dump(['this', 'is', 'a new list'], mysavedata, -1)

with open(fileName, 'rb') as myrestoredata:

cond = True

while cond:

try:

read_data = pickle.load(myrestoredata)
print read_data

except:

cond = False

Chapters 5 and 6:

No comments. Excellent chapters.

Chapters 7 and 8:

Well, this chapters as the rest are excellent, with examples that one can follow, and help to understand. But web development is a topic for a separate book. Two chapters just shows the "peak of the iceberg"

Chapter 9:

Great chapter, good examples.

Chapters 10 and 11:

Even when this last chapter are great, with good examples and all. In total, this books use 4 chapters to introduce web deployment of python programs. But that means is a subject as I say before, that is very broad. One need to know and understand HTML, and how webpages work. As mention in this book, Head First has another book for that. So, if you like web development, and already know some of it, and want to start using Python, to help with it, this chapters will be nice for you. But in my opinion, 4 chapters could had been enough for a good introduction into GUI development. Maybe even some serial (RS 232)interface to be able to control some peripherals.

Comments about O'Reilly Media Head First Python:

Having been a fan of the HeadFirst learning style ever since a good friend of mine introduced me to it last year, I was very pleased when I saw there was one on Python coming out. Not a completely new person to programming, I heeded the warning that it was aimed at someone already with some OOP experience, rather than the absolute novice... and found the book very easy to follow, with good examples and exercises. I not only would recommend it to people I know, I already have!

Comments about O'Reilly Media Head First Python:

I am extraordinarily disappointed with this book. As Fale from Milan, Italy notes, it could better be classified as an assembly of notes, not a book on learning python. I thought I had bought a book on learning python. Further, The logic seems sloppy (ref page 18 which references a one name item in a list as an "inner list", then notes that it "could" have had more items... sloppy). Sadly, this book falls into the too common trap of presuming the reader already knows what the book is supposed to be teaching (so why buy the book?).
This book might be useful for someone who is expert in at least one oop and just wants notes on best practice. If that is the intended market, it should be clearly stated. It wasn't.
Sorry. I am a big O'Reilly fan, but not a fan of this book.

Comments about O'Reilly Media Head First Python:

This book is a very particular book, from my point of view. This book, in fact, is not the classic programming book. If I can, I would define this more a bunch of notes rather than a book. I'm not saying that this is bad, as a matter of facts, I do like it. Even if I've programmed for many years, this book is very interesting. I think this book is able to responds exactly at the needs of a person that is just starting with Python. The book is very clear and has a lot of exercises etc. If followed correctly, it becomes really easy to remember quite as everything the book speaks about.

The book, nevertheless is for beginners, is very completed and speaks of some really pro topics such as web-apps and mobile apps.

I would like to remember that O'Reilly has another similar book (Head First Programming). While Head First Python is focused on the language itself, Head First Programming is more focused on the programming than Python, even if it uses Python as reference language.

Comments about O'Reilly Media Head First Python:

There are two books devoted to Python you can find within Head First series. One of them is related indirectly - Head First Programming, second one is explicitly focused on Python - Head First Python. If you take a look at the content description you will find that some parts of material overlaps. If you ask yourself whether these are two different titles, answer is - yes, these are two different books. Even thou both are devoted to Python, you will find them different. Head First Programming focuses on telling reader what programming is, while Head First Python goes directly into Python related topics. Another benefit of this book is that it touches various aspects of Python usage - application programming, Web development, Mobile development.

What I like in the book is a way things are explained. Head First approach is one of favorite, so I like the book automatically - in a way. On the other hand, I think it could be better bundled with Head First Programming. Both books cover the same topics in few places which makes it questionable to buy both of them. Putting it straight. If you want to focus on Python itself, and you know what programming is all about - Head First Python is a good choice. If you don't know any programming language or you want to learn programming through the Python, definitely buy Head First Programming instead of this one.