Other companies actually use Python though.

I've seen websites that offer interactive programing environments with lessons, never really tried one and I don't really know if that's your style of learning or not, personally that's not for me. I usually learn new languages by going through a tutorial or two and then I just start programming. When I get stuck I start reading docs.

The basics of python are probably not going to be a problem to anyone who knows any existing language, I could probably "teach" you them in an hour. After you'd screwed with it for a day then I could probably teach you a few more pythonic things in an hour or 2, like comprehensions, functional programming, variable scope gotchas, etc.

Probably the best thing, IMO, would be to write (or rewrite) a small project that is simple (say less than 1000 lines) and have someone experienced review it. A big part of learning a language is learning the idioms, and I haven't found a better way to do that than working with another programmer. Just like with human languages, you learn idioms by talking to native speakers, not from books.

I'd be happy to look over stuff or answer questions. I've been using python as one of my primary languages for about 10 years now.

You could put the Methods in a Map keyed by the verb (String), and invoke it that way.

So:

Method call = methodMap.get(verb);
Object returnedValues = call.invoke(classObject, argsObject);

Thanks for the offer, I may end up taking you up on that.

I just need to come up with a project I want to work on.

I don't know how it is with others here, but I don't really do any coding outside of work (although I would like to start doing some).

I am pretty much always working on some side projects. Just kind of the way I am. I rarely really "finish" anything though, I have some projects I've worked on for years and they're basically still just working prototypes. A lot of the time I just want to use it myself so I tinker with it until it does the next thing I want and then shelve it for a while.

Re-writing an existing project is a good exercise because you've already debugged the logical details and just need to consider implementation. You might already have test cases or at the very least something to compare it to. When I started learning python I rewrote a lot of the poker stuff I'd written over the years.

Build scripts for embedded type systems are very often written in Python.

N..no they arent?

A lot of our test and CI stuff is written in Python and Groovy.

My company's only angle right now is incorporating our software at the embedded level with device manufacturers. Basically our software is acting as an interface between hardware accelerators, in which we offload C-written algorithms onto the hardware to execute certain tasks. This involves a lot of cross compilation, and we are partners with some major hardware manufacturers - I've been heavily involved with demos with this stuff so I have had to build these various solutions a million times. I've only seen ****ty shell scripts so far on the manufacturer's end, and we're partners with some major, major hardware manufacturers.

And I have written stuff in groovy for our CI/CL stuff and it is not the same what I am talking about here.

I have a recruiter from Lyft hit me up last month asking if I was interested. I told them I wasn't at the time. Fast forward to now about a month later, I replied back via email to see if they were willing to set up a call. It is dead silence... the recruiter even accepted my linkedin invite, looked at my linkedin message and profile.

What's the deal?

I have no idea how stuff like this affects a company's hiring roadmap, but they did just go public in the last month (and have their stock drop off by ~20% in the process).

They might have selected or are in the process of selecting a candidate for the role that they wanted to discuss with you.

In the interest of not getting into a silly debate about if Python is widely used in scripting including build scripts.

This article isn’t about build scripts per se. It deals more with how Python can effectively be used in embedded programming environments.

Python in Embedded Systems

Here is an article more to the point:

Build Automation Using Python

Quote:

Once upon a time, we did build automation using batch files and the makefile from hell. When there wasn’t anybody left in the team who could update the makefile without going insane when dependencies changed, we started looking for a new tool. The choice fell onFinalBuilder, a comprehensive, graphical build automation utility sporting loads of predefined actions that can be arranged using drag and drop.

After the initial excitement had faded and we had converted all our build scripts to FinalBuilder projects, we realized that we had ended up with something that had a nice GUI, but was far from perfect. For instance, FinalBuilder uses a proprietary XML based file format for its project files and tracking changes in large XML documents is… hard. Managing control flow using drag and drop is… weird. And as a rookie in the team, learning a new tool only used for one specific purpose seems… unnecessary.

So after living with FinalBuilder for a few years we finally took the plunge and converted everything once more, but this time to our new favorite scripting language – Python! Our builds aren’t really that complicated and are usually just a sequence of some of the following actions:

Compile projects in a Visual Studio solution (.

Add some digital signatures to binaries and .msi packages

Compress, package and move files around

Update various files with e.g. new version numbers

For one of our product builds we went from an XML document having more than 18,000 lines into two Python scripts totaling around 450 lines of code out of which more than half can be re-used!

I mentioned this area to explore in learning Python because my impression from looking at the code i have had access to is that very often there is a lot of room for improvement.

Rusty and I sound very similar. I am always working on something at home in some random framework or language and I never finish anything of value.

It helps me a ton in my day job but it hurts in the dream of making a valuable product and working for myself

Speaking of, if anyone else is at PyCon PM me if you wanna kick it. After looking over the schedule I have a pretty definite plan for sessions tomorrow.

Standard stuff. Some recruiters will respond back and others don't. Various reasons. Just find another Lyft recruiter on linkedin and ping them. Or what I did was just directly apply to 2-3 positions and I got a response in a few days.

FYI Python bundle at Humble Bundle https://www.humblebundle.com/books/p...n=tile_index_2

I would imagine Lyft is hiring. They did just go public so expect a mass exodus of employees in about 5 months when the lockup ends. On top of that their stock is tanking, so I doubt many outside people are looking to jump aboard a sinking stock price with the same enthusiasm they were before.

Sorry to ask this but I know you guys are all JS and node devs:

what is the standard for JS documentation? is it like javadocs? I know Java has java docs, C has man pages, etc. Is there a standard tool/method for generating API documentation?

It's not exactly like javadocs but we use RAML for API documentation. On it's own RAML is not a documentation method, it's a way to specify your APIs - what arguments they take, what they return, etc. You can make sort of a "sketch" of your API or you can be very complete, including schemas for post data and returned results.

We use RAML to generate docs, using a program called raml2html. It's fairly customizable but we mostly use it out of the box.

We also use the RAML spec to validate our endpoints - I have tests that go through every API in the RAML spec and call the "examples" and make sure the results match the expected schema/return codes/etc. It's more of a smoke test than anything.

We also use RAML for real time validation - I can import the POST body schemas and apply them to incoming data, and give 400s to anything that doesn't pass the spec.

Having one document that functions in all these roles makes it a little easier to assert that certain things about your API are true. It also really helps in integrating between services. If the RAML spec is right it's easier to figure out how to call a service, and easier to generate mocks for it.

I've never seen one place that actually used a JS doc browser the way you can with Javadocs.

I have seen a lot of half-hearted attempts at using the annotation in code though, which wastes a ton of space and gets out of date very quickly.

Questions for people who did boot camps:

1. How many months was yours?
2. How many hours a day were you in class?
3. How much homework on average?
4. How many different classes did you take?

I'm considering the idea of opening up boot camp in Latin America - maybe in San Jose Costa Rica - teach programming and DevOps. I don't want to break the bank, just cover my living expenses and maybe a little on the top.

Thanks guys

3 months
9am-6pm M-F with 1 hour for lunch
I'd say the average person spent 3 hours a day doing readings for the next class and finishing the project for the day. Some spent much more or much less
Not sure what you mean how many different classes - we covered a lot of ground. Each day was an hour or so of lecture on a topic followed by project work with a partner.