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Look Inside... Python Programming Third EditionCora Harrison

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Python Programming for the Absolute Beginner, 3rd Edition 3rd Edition

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716 ratings

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If you are new to programming with Python and are looking for a solid introduction, this is the book for you. Developed by computer science instructors, books in the "for the absolute beginner" series teach the principles of programming through simple game creation. You will acquire the skills that you need for practical Python programming applications and will learn how these skills can be put to use in real-world scenarios. Throughout the chapters, you will find code samples that illustrate concepts presented. At the end of each chapter, you will find a complete game that demonstrates the key ideas in the chapter, a summary of the chapter, and a set of challenges that tests your newfound knowledge. By the time you finish this book, you’ll be well versed in Python and be able to apply the basic programming principles you’ve learned to the next programming language you tackle.

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Perfect for the beginning programmer who wants to learn Python--a powerful, flexible, and concise programming language.

Each new concept is taught using a simple example program, and an end-of-chapter project ties together all of the concepts learned.

Each end-of-chapter project is game-based, making programming fun and accessible.

The accompanying website contains all of the software needed to write and run the programs in the book.

About the Author

Michael Dawson has worked as both a programmer and a computer game designer and producer. In addition to real-world game industry experience, Dawson earned his bachelor's degree in Computer Science from the University of Southern California. He currently teaches game programming and design to students of all ages through UCLA Extension courses and private lessons. Visit his Web site at www.programgames.com to learn more or to get support for any of his books.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Course Technology
Publication date ‏ : ‎ January 1, 2010
Edition ‏ : ‎ 3rd
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Print length ‏ : ‎ 455 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1435455002
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1435455009
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 2.1 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 7.5 x 1.25 x 9.25 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #298,289 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #156 in Computer Programming Languages
- #222 in Introductory & Beginning Programming
- #277 in Python Programming

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716 ratings

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Michael Dawson

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Michael Dawson has worked as both a programmer and a computer game designer and producer. In addition to real world game industry experience, Mike earned his bachelor's degree in Computer Science from the University of Southern California. Currently, he teaches game programming in the Game Production Department of the Los Angeles Film School. Mike has also taught game programming to students through UCLA Extension and The Digital Media Academy at Stanford. He's the author of four books: Beginning C++ through Game Programming, Guide to Programming with Python, and C++ Projects: Programming with Text-Based Games. You can visit his website at www.programgames.com to learn more or to get support for any of his books.

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Customers find this programming book easy to understand, particularly as an introduction to Python, with lots of practical examples that help with knowledge retention. They appreciate its humorous approach and consider it suitable for absolute beginners. The code functionality receives mixed feedback, with some finding the code samples very useful while others report that the code doesn't work. The pace of the book is slow for some customers, and while the downloadable content is available, customers note that the software listings are missing.

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Ease of learning Knowledge retention Humor Beginners Code functionality Pace Download speed Software availability

97 customers mention "Ease of learning"75 positive22 negative

Customers find the book easy to understand and appreciate it as a good introduction to programming and Python. One customer notes that the information is presented in an easy-to-follow format.

"...instruction, I can say that I'm very impressed by the readability of this book and the way it teaches programming...." Read more

"Python Programming for the Absolute Beginner, Helps Me Greatly... We Used it In Class" Read more

"...They are hard enough but not too hard. They generally required a fair amount of time and effort, but I was able to finally figure out all of them...." Read more

"...This approach has finally made things start making sense. I am even able to figure out the Challenges at the end of the chapter and I am loving it!..." Read more

28 customers mention "Knowledge retention"25 positive3 negative

Customers appreciate the book's practical examples, with one customer noting how they clearly go through each subject and another mentioning the good analogies used to illustrate concepts.

"...He uses good analogies to illustrate concepts, and in general I've made steady progress through the book and am retaining a lot of knowledge...." Read more

"Python Programming for the Absolute Beginner, Helps Me Greatly... We Used it In Class" Read more

"...through the chapters slowly and methodically, threading multiple examples into each concept. The code, while simple, is fairly elegant...." Read more

"...There are homework challenges at the end of each chapter, and working source code for the lesson tasks should you get lost...." Read more

7 customers mention "Humor"7 positive0 negative

Customers find the book humorous and entertaining.

"...The author has an refreshing sense of humor compared to your typical, dry, professor book. The only I'm a little hesitant about are the examples...." Read more

"...Michael Dawson does an excellent job of presenting the material in a fun way...." Read more

"...was easy to navigate and download and the exercises are awesome...and FUN. Michael Dawson is a GENIOUS...." Read more

"...and understanding clearly and concisely, as well as in an entertaining way. I'm looking forward to reading his C++ book too...." Read more

6 customers mention "Beginners"6 positive0 negative

Customers find the book suitable for absolute beginners, with one customer noting that the first three chapters are particularly helpful.

"...Both books are excellent for beginners and have overlapping content. This book covers OOP where Automate avoids it completely." Read more

"Easy to read and fun! This is definately for the absolute beginner...." Read more

"...But it's a good start!" Read more

"Not a Good Book. First 3 chapters are OK...." Read more

10 customers mention "Code functionality"5 positive5 negative

Customers have mixed experiences with the code functionality in the book, with some finding the code samples very useful while others report that the code doesn't work.

"...my thoughts on this book and let people know that the code samples are indeed available, though the url in the book is sadly incorrect...." Read more

"...and I have to keep going on the net trying to find out why my code doesn't work only to find out that the syntax is completely different then is..." Read more

"...The code samples still work, but are increasingly difficult to follow, and the challenges appear more and more daunting...." Read more

"...in the book, that allows one to download the code examples, does not work. When I finally did find the site, it required payment...." Read more

9 customers mention "Pace"3 positive6 negative

Customers have mixed opinions about the book's pace, with several noting it is slow, while one customer mentions steady progress through the chapters.

"...They seem really complicated at a glance and although Dawson explains them well, I would never be able to write that example myself...." Read more

"...to illustrate concepts, and in general I've made steady progress through the book and am retaining a lot of knowledge...." Read more

"...downhill in terms of instruction at that point with lots of instructions passed over rapidly with little explanation...." Read more

"...The code samples still work, but are increasingly difficult to follow, and the challenges appear more and more daunting...." Read more

4 customers mention "Download speed"2 positive2 negative

Customers have mixed experiences with the book's downloadable content, with some successfully downloading the source material, while others report issues with the provided website links.

"...P.S. The downloadable content is online, just google the book name and author, maybe even the publisher - it's online." Read more

"...that the code samples are indeed available, though the url in the book is sadly incorrect...." Read more

"...I had no trouble downloading the source material. You are directed to a web site which asks for the author's name...." Read more

"...i have is the website given for each of the examples to download the file does not work. [...]..." Read more

4 customers mention "Software availability"0 positive4 negative

Customers report issues with software availability in the book, noting that none of the listed software is provided and one customer mentions that the supporting software download is not available.

"...The chapter on GUI programming is useless. None of the software listed in the book works because LiveWires and tkinter are either non existent or do..." Read more

"Wrong edition, needs to be updated. Software inaccessible." Read more

"Missing software..." Read more

"Supporting Software Download Not Available...." Read more

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Kent Hudson
Great book, and the code samples are available on the author's site
Reviewed in the United States on August 11, 2011
Verified Purchase

I was a little hesitant to buy this book since some reviews pointed out that due to a publisher change the sample files were no longer available for download. I grabbed the Kindle sample anyway, though, and found that the author's website (the url of which is in the book) has the files. So while it may be slightly confusing to have the wrong url in the text of the book, the author's website (which is also printed right in the front of the book) does have the files you need. So this criticism of the book is not warranted.

Anyway, as for the book itself, I'm about halfway through and have found it very useful. I was taking a beginner's class in Python before buying this book, but since the classes were only once per week I wanted to learn faster. As such, I'm able to compare how this book teaches the concepts of Python programming against how the teachers in my class present the same concepts. And while there's no substitute for personal, interactive instruction, I can say that I'm very impressed by the readability of this book and the way it teaches programming. The code samples are very useful for showing how Python works, and the writing style is very easy to follow. He uses good analogies to illustrate concepts, and in general I've made steady progress through the book and am retaining a lot of knowledge. The searchability of the Kindle version is especially helpful, since it's easy to skip back to previous concepts if you need a quick refresher.

Anyway, I just wanted to share my thoughts on this book and let people know that the code samples are indeed available, though the url in the book is sadly incorrect. But again, just check the author's website and you can obtain them, which is highly recommended because they do make the learning much more interactive and hands-on.

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Tom
Python Programming for the Absolute Beginner
Reviewed in the United States on September 14, 2024
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Python Programming for the Absolute Beginner, Helps Me Greatly... We Used it In Class

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Sanford
Fine Choice for First Programming Book
Reviewed in the United States on August 4, 2010
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I am a beginner with respect to programming, and do not have a particularly technical background: I know almost no math though I know formal logic pretty well. I was interested in learning something about computer programming just for fun and have looked through a number of books about a number of languages. I even spent some time with C before I decided on Python. To an absolute beginner, it seemed a relatively intuitive language without some of the messy detail required by C, for example, about memory allocation. I chose this book simply because it looked fun and very clear. Each chapter focuses on tools needed to create games. I do not have any interest at all in playing computer games of any kind, but it is a relatively painless way to learn Python. I also found the exercises at the end of each chapter very good. They are hard enough but not too hard. They generally required a fair amount of time and effort, but I was able to finally figure out all of them. This is important since I am doing this on my own.

The Cons: The book aims to be simple and brief, but sometimes it is too simple and brief. Yes I learned to get the computer to do this or that, but I did not fully get some of the concepts. In fact, I think the book moved on to fancy stuff like graphics before I got down all I needed of the basics such as file control. Perhaps someone who already knew something about programming would have had less trouble. For example, the material on writing to a file stored on the hard drive for future use was fine, as far as it went. But I realized, when trying to write a program of my own, that I did not understand a key point. If you have recorded some data to a file, and then want to revise that data, Python rewrites the entire file. Huh? What about my original data? It gets over written. There has to be a solution to this problem, but I did not find it in the book. After hours of work I devised a way to get the right result, but it was very messy and, when I posted a question on a Python forum, I found there was a simple way to do what I wanted. Maybe I am a bit thick, but I think this could have been directly covered in the book. There were several other topics that needed more discussion.

Still, keeping in mind that this book only goes so far, it is a very good introduction to Python. But if you are serious about learning Python, at some point, you are going to need one of those big fat and far more boring books.

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76 people found this helpful

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Teresa
Wow...I am hooked
Reviewed in the United States on November 29, 2010
Verified Purchase
I have tried many programming books. I have even taken a programming class or two but it has never really clicked before. There have always been to many jumps from explanation to assumed understanding. I would get lost and things never clicked. Recently I decided to give programming another chance because I believed somewhere in the back of my mind that I should be able to figure this out. I have been a system administrator for years but have never delved into scripting or programming before because I thought maybe I was just never meant to be a programmer. I decided maybe it was just the way I learn. So I decided first to start out with a HeadFirst book. It lost me immediately. The way it was presented in that book definitely didn't click for me. I set back to the task of finding a book and came across this one. This is it. I love the way he goes through the code and then has you run it and then explains what every line of code is doing. This approach has finally made things start making sense. I am even able to figure out the Challenges at the end of the chapter and I am loving it! Thank you Michael Dawson!

On another note...I notice that people are having problems finding the files that go with the book. If you take the link recommended it the book and then go to downloads it is rather confusing, but if you go to the link recommended in the book and then do a search for python and then take the link for this book, another screen will come up that will give you an option to view available downloads. Harder than it needs to be admittedly, but that is how I found them.

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Adrian
Not only was it easy to read
Reviewed in Canada on November 14, 2014
Verified Purchase

I purchased this book with "ZERO" understanding or existing knowledge of Python. Not only was it easy to read, the book is set up in that makes learning programming much easier, they don't throw you in the deep end right away.
Python Programming is clear, easy and very useful. Forget the other books, this is all you need to get you started.

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Amazon Customer
Heard Great, not yet finished
Reviewed in India on November 30, 2018
Verified Purchase
I got this book, instead I could have bought the other one

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Alberto Mario Mura
Ottimo per l'avviamento alla programmazione degli adolescenti
Reviewed in Italy on April 25, 2016
Verified Purchase
Il libro è molto ben strutturato e molto chiaro. Mio figlio di 15 anni lo sta studiando con molto interesse. L'originale approccio, che usa la costruzione di giochi come mezzo per insegnare la programmazione in generale è davvero un'ottima idea, che l'autore ha realizzato in maniera davvero efficace ed esaustiva. Il testo è perfetto per far apprendere i fondamenti della programmazione ai ragazzi. La scelta di Python è ottima, perché Python dispone di un'interprete che consente un riscontro immediato anche a una singola istruzione e tuttavia consente di creare applicazioni che possono essere eseguite dal SO. Inoltre Python è, notoriamente, un linguaggio indipendente dal sistema operativo usato, anche se il libro fa riferimento soprattutto al suo uso in ambiente Windows.

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Igor
Cool für (junge) Anfänger
Reviewed in Germany on February 19, 2014
Verified Purchase
Es ist ein klasse Buch, um Programmieren zu lernen, allerdings auch für Leute, die Spielen etwas abgewinnen können, denn die Beispiele und Challenges basieren darauf. Ich habe vor dem Buch in meinem Leben keine einzige Zeile Code geschrieben, nach dem Durchlesen konnte ich einige Game-Klassiker kopieren und mich in andere Richtungen weiterentwickeln.

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S Bruce
A steep learning curve, but excellent for both beginners and programmers migrating to Python
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 13, 2012
Verified Purchase
This is actually among the best teach yourself programming books I've read for any programming language, not just Python.

I've done a fair bit of programming before, in various versions of BASIC, PHP, JavaScript etc., so I was able to skim-read most of the first half of the book, the 'absolute beginner bit' which begins with the first principles of programming such as variables, loops, and functions, just to work out what Python's unique quirks are (above all, it's the first language I've come across where indentation is vitally important rather than just tidy). The section on dictionaries and tuples I had to read carefully, as I found Python's approach to arrays a bit fiddly compared to other languages I've used, but most of it was straightforward.

If you've really never programmed a computer before, I think it would be a fairly steep learning curve- this'll be a good book to choose, but you should take things very slowly, absorb each page carefully, and reinforce what you've learnt by trying the extra programming challenges at the end of each chapter. If you don't do this and just plough through from one chapter to the next, then before long it may start going over your head if you're not careful.

The second half of the book is generally excellent too, and worth reading if you're new to Python, even if you're not a new programmer. Object Orientated Programming is explained and adhered to nicely, and by using some of Python's pre-prepared libraries, you can jump from simple text manipulation to complex-looking Windows-style applications and games without much trouble.

Michael Dawson has a very understandable writing style. Occasional flashes of humour (not too flippant) and some well-chosen example programs that are actually engaging and useful make you want to carry on reading. It's very well ordered and thought-out, and the progression from one challenge to the next, although quite steep in parts, is sensible and just feels right.

I'd recommend this highly both to people new to programming, and programmers new to Python.

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5.0 out of 5 stars Great book, and the code samples are available on the author's site

5.0 out of 5 stars Python Programming for the Absolute Beginner

4.0 out of 5 stars Fine Choice for First Programming Book

5.0 out of 5 stars Wow...I am hooked

Top reviews from other countries

5.0 out of 5 stars Not only was it easy to read

5.0 out of 5 stars Heard Great, not yet finished

5.0 out of 5 stars Ottimo per l'avviamento alla programmazione degli adolescenti

5.0 out of 5 stars Cool für (junge) Anfänger

5.0 out of 5 stars A steep learning curve, but excellent for both beginners and programmers migrating to Python

Great book, and the code samples are available on the author's site

Python Programming for the Absolute Beginner

Fine Choice for First Programming Book

Wow...I am hooked

Not only was it easy to read

Heard Great, not yet finished

Ottimo per l'avviamento alla programmazione degli adolescenti

Cool für (junge) Anfänger

A steep learning curve, but excellent for both beginners and programmers migrating to Python