Like my title suggests, if you have programming experience and you do not mind or have little trouble reading the Python documentation in a online fashion then its probably not absolutely necessary that you have to buy the book.

However, the author is very good in instilling the nature of Python programming and he's good at getting you to think about the concepts but this book is definitely not a cookbook. Last thing is that it doesn't concentrate on the GUI nor library usage etc as it's mission is simply to teach you about the core of Python

This book is great! Good writing, good exercises. Good for people who have some experience in programming. If you have never had any contact to other languages or logic, consider studying some introdutory topics before reading this book.

This is a really good introduction to Python. It is very clear, accessible and has quite a lot of substantial content. It does not get into the really deep details, but that is OK because if it tried to the book would become overwhelming. On the other hand, unlike some python books it is not so light and superficial to be good for newbies only. I think this is a great starter book on Python.

"This topic will be covered later in the book" is the phrase most often encountered in this book.
Funny - but even on page 593 (out of 635 where appendix begins) we still see "we'll meet such an example in Chapter 28".
It seems like if you take out all the phrases that promise you to explain things in the rest of the book, the book itself will thrink 1/4 of it's size. Why do I even need to be told that you will cover it later in the book - I ASSUME it will be covered if you mention it. If not - refer me to some other resource.
The phrase above is just an example of the writting-alota-words-to-fill-up-space style. The legacy seems to have been carried forward into programming python by the same author on which I am working now.
Unfortunately this seems to be the best book in it's class, and there really is nothing to compare it to (considering it covers python2.5).
Even though I was done with the book in few weeks, I would still have preferred a more concise and to-the-point text.

An excellent book for anyone new to both programming and the Python programming language.

If you want to learn how to program and are unsure where to begin, this book is definitely worth considering, both for it's concise, clear explanation of Python and programming concepts in general, and because the language Python is itself clear and concise.

Pros:
-Clear, concise
-Well written, decent pace
-Good intro for non-programmers
-Leads nicely into Programming Python and Python Cookbook
-Python itself is easy to learn, clear, and yet still powerful and cross-platform

Cons:
-Tends to drag in the beginning, spending too much time going over the details of the language instead of diving right into some useful code.
-NOT for programmers who have other language(s) under their belts. Consider Programming Python instead.

As a ASIC Validation Engineer I need to write many scripts on daily basis. I use Perl for that. Never worked with Python before. I don't have any idea about OOP as well. My knowledge is limited to Verilog/VHDL and C. So I have decided to learn Python to get more flexibility in my job. I tried with many books but none of those are user friendly. If you have previous scripting knowledge and if you want to learn Python very quickly then this is the book for you. I think the best way is to translate your code into Python and then see the magic. I don't recommend this if you don't have good reading habit. Otherwise 5 star for me!

I used to say that there were several good books for learning Python. You just had to browse them and choose what works for you. Not anymore. This third edition, along with coverage of Python2.5, adds dark tabs for the exercises at the ends of most chapters, and I think that many people can now learn the language by just trying the exercises and comparing with the answers in the back. The sidebars are interesting. The tables are clear. The examples are instructive. The typesetting is well-chosen. Despite all the materials availabe free on the web, this book is worth the price.

I've been wanting to learn Python for a while. Hearing that the 3rd edition of Learning Python had added "exercises", I ordered it. It was a mistake.

The book winds its way through each facet of the language one by one, making no attempt to integrate what you are supposed to be learning into a working, functional solid.

The exercises consist of simple parrot questions: "Name the four major components of the module search path." Even the major exercises are childish. After the chapter "Advanced Function Topics", write a function which prints its single argument. Then try passing it more than one argument, or no arguments, to see what happens!

The code examples are never more than five lines, usually initialization of a variable, then a toy operation on that variable, with in-line comments taking the place of actual demonstration. A particularly choice tidbit comes when the author demonstrates making user-defined classes adopt the iteration protocol. He gives as an example a class which iterates over a predefined series of square numbers, then finishes the section with a note to the effect that such a simple procedure should really be programmed using a list comprehension.

The author constantly urges the reader to try things in interactive mode, but he doesn't give much of an idea what to try. Of course the reader can make up exercises, or rewrite a old program, which is what I have resorted to, using this book as a reference manual, but that's hardly ideal. The author is an expert on Python, and I don't know anything yet; he should be directing my exploration of the language, not just handing me an atlas.

I give this book credit for completeness and for clarity of explanation. The author lays out language features and tells you how they operate in a way that is easy to grasp. What he fails to do is to get the reader coding and actually using all the bits of the language, so that actual work can be done. He notes that the creator of Python has a mathematical background, which accounts for the consistency of the language design. It may also account for the lack of practical instruction.

I've been wanting to learn Python for a while. Hearing that the 3rd edition of Learning Python had added "exercises", I ordered it. It was a mistake.

The book winds its way through each facet of the language one by one, making no attempt to integrate what you are supposed to be learning.

The exercises consist of simple parrot questions: "Name the four major components of the module search path." Even the major exercises are childish. After the chapter "Advanced Function Topics", write a function which prints its single argument. Then try passing it more than one argument!

The code examples are never more than five lines, usually initialization of a variable, then a toy operation on that variable, with in-line comments taking the place of actual demonstration.

The author constantly urges the reader to try things in interactive mode, but he doesn't give you much of an idea what to try. Of course the reader can make up exercises, or rewrite a old program, which is what I have resorted to, using this book as a reference manual, but that's hardly ideal. The author is an expert on Python, and I don't know anything yet; he should be directing my exploration of the language, not just handing me an atlas.

I give this book credit for completeness and for clarity of explanation. The author lays out language features and tells you how they operate in a way that is easy to grasp. What he fails to do is to get the reader coding and actually using all the bits of the language, so that actual work can be done. He notes that the creator of Python has a mathematical background, which accounts for the consistency of the language design. It may also account for the lack of practical instruction.

Python has the reputation to be a language that is easy to learn. Well, why do you need a book more than 500 pages to only learn the language then? The answer is that even if you can learn the basics very fast, it has a lot of bells and whistles that can take time to master.

This book covers only the language not the libraries, but covers it very well. Highly recommended reading once you'll want to use the language to write something bigger than a script of 10 lines.

4 stars only because I would have expected some exposure to the standard libraries as well for a book called "Learning Python"

I'm talking about the 3rd edition. It's the first book about Python that I read, so I can't make a comparison. It may be just the best first book out there, but I'm not impressed. The book reads like a draft, not a book in its 3rd edition. The author just keeps repeating himself on minor points in subsections back and forth. It's 700 pages long, but I wish it were half the length, after cutting needless elaboration and repetition. Perhaps the older editions are more concise. On the other hand, we readers may not have a choice.

If you are a top-down learner this book is not for you. You can safely pick "Dive into Python".
However, if you are the bottom-up type, you will not regret. While the Python slogan promises "one way to do it", Mark Lutz will show you four, and explore every detail, like complex list comprehensions, closures and the diamond inheritance pattern. This is why you will wait 200 pages (exploring data types) until the introduction of the first Python statement, and 200 pages more for the first script.
But if you cross the details, you will get excellent understandings of the core Python logic, which will save you countless debugging hours in the future.
The OO part alone worth the entire book. It's going from the very basics of OO programming up to elementary design patterns and some advanced OO implementation issues in Python.
One last caution: although 600 pages, this book should be really read cover to cover. It's a true tutorial, which gradually develops the major concepts (sequences, assignments, references, objects, namespaces etc) from the ground up, with (midterm?) exercises. Give yourself a few hours to really learn, exercise your brain (and fully grasp 100 ways to silently override your variables with namespace mistakes). It's a great book.

This book was very handy as a reference when having to learn python in depth pretty quickly, only gave it 4 stars because it didn't go deep enough in a few areas for my taste but I keep going back to it now and then and I'm glad I have it on my bookshelf.

After getting a review copy of Learning Python, 3rd edition, I had forgot how much really great material was in the book. If you are interested in learning about Python 2.6 and Python 3000, and have some experience with Programming in another language this is an excellent book.

This book is not a reference book like the excellent Python Essential Reference, but more of a example driven guide through features of the language. I would pick this book up even if you know Python, as it covers new language features that have not been documented in some books.

'Learning Python' is one of those rare books that is an absolute MUST BUY. If you want to learn Python or want to become a better Python developer, this book is essential... E-SSEN-TIAL.

The author Mark Lutz is the guru of Python and he bares his Python-loving soul in this book. Covering 29 chapters, you will go from the basics of the history of the language and main uses to all the goodies that you would expect. Declaring variables, conditional branches, types, strings, documentation, functions, modules, OOP, database access, it's all here and is it ever goooood.

I was going to go into more detail about why you should buy this book but I'm stopping here. You came to this page because you are going to program in Python or want to learn more about it right? Buy the book and get coding!!!

***** HIGHEST POSSIBLE RECOMMENDATION

You can learn Python from Learning Python. But for a language that's attracted a lot of hype about its wonderful LISPy conceptual features (e.g., anonymous functions), this is a sadly pedestrian book in a lot of ways. Here are some complaints (I end with a request, so skip down if you must.)

1. There are way too many (i.e., more than five) screenshots of Windows programs, with accompanying instructions (thanks guys!) to find things in the "Start" folder. OK, that's snobbish, I guess I can just skip it. But it makes me feel uncool.

2. OOP is introduced very poorly, in fragmented ways, that do not aid deep understanding. I know LISP. I know C. I do not know OOP. If python is OOP, and in a cool, not bolted-on fashion, I want you to introduce and develop OOP concepts as we go along so I can get the hang on things. As it stands, things are introduced in a haphazard fashion for a long time -- what are __allthesethings__ I keep seeing? Even though the type handling explanation is done in a natural fashion. I think it's reasonable to expect that readers have understood *some* language before turning to Python, so you can throw us in the deep end as long as you're a good instructor.

3. The documentation features are introduced early, and very poorly. They just don't make intuitive sense as presented, and it's not helping that the examples are cutsey (a function that squares things is doc'd "Then we take your liver".) Actually, examples are all like this, kind of weird, arbitrary and dumb, which makes comprehension hard. Monty Python references, OK, fine, but at least have them make a little sense?

4. 2+3 are running problems with the book (another concept thrown up without explanation: functions, whose syntax is not explained until chapters later.)

5. Problems at the end of chapters are not particularly strong. There should be fewer of them, and they should be of greater complexity and challenge. That's a pedagogical opinion, of course, and reasonable people can disagree.

I think you can learn Python from this book. In fact, I'm sure of it given the comments here and the O'Reilly editorial team. But I'm on page 180, and I've come here to complain that while everyone is telling me that python is as slick as perl, with the conceptual elegance of an OOPy LISP, this book is doing an insanely poor job of proving the case.

Perhaps I've been spoiled by good books. But maybe someone can help this princess and recommend a better one for Python than this?

That's it. If you want to learn Python, it's a great place to start. Be sure to follow up with Programming Python, by the same author.

I am pleased with this book. I read about half of the way through it and then decided to keep it close by as a reference guide. As a reading guide to 'Learning Python' it can get a little monotonous. This really isn't the author's fault, who shows a slight, persistent but non-distracting humor. I think some monotony is inherent in learning any programming language - 1) here is "Concept A," 2) here is how/why "Concept A" is implemented in general, 3) here are some particulars to keep in mind when implementing "Concept A", 4) here are the myriad of variable methods of implementation. This book covers mostly the 1 through 3 ideas above and leaves most of idea 4 for more advanced books or reference material. The author does a good job of managing content. There are places that give an overview and state that more detail is ahead, but the instance where a concept or implementation is initially mentioned and the degree to which it is described is adequate for the current context. The 'more detail' that eventually comes along then fits nicely into its own 'more detailed' context. In other words, I didn't feel like I had to jump forward 5 chapters to understand one aspect of the current chapter. What the book lacks, or blissfully does not include, is any lengthy code constructions (this can be good, bad, or mean nothing, depending on your learning style and requirements). "Python Programming, An Intro to Computer Science" is a bit more engaging but, ultimately, is not as verbose or specific where needed. I read through allot of books and actually see these two as worthy complements. I also use Python Programming, Python Essential Reference, Python in a Nutshell and Python Cookbook as supplemental references. Sometimes I am looking for an overview of a concept, just an example of code syntax, all the options available for implementing a construct, or how someone else approached a common problem, etc. Each book has its time and place. I tend to use Learning Python for the overview with some examples and consider it a useful companion to the online and other reference materials.

I bought an earlier incarnation of this title a year or two ago and sent it back immediately. I was pretty wary of making the same mistake twice, but I'm happy to say that this 3rd edition is a significant improvement. I have a feeling it's a bit too obtuse for those who are new to programming in general, but if you've been at it for a while and simply need to pick up the various and less commonly used features of the language, it's a fine introductory text. It even highlights some of the upcoming changes in Python 3; not necessarily in any meaningful way, but it gives you enough information to future-proof your code as much as possible so as to make porting easier.

Unfortunately it is riddled with tragically unfunny Monty Python catchphrases you probably got tired of hearing 20 years ago. I can't wait for someone to create a language named "Rick James" or "What" so we can go on hearing Chappelle's Show quotes regurgitated ad nauseum.

I admit i haven't finished the book yet, but i'll give my impressions here. The book is a great source for beginners. If the reader is a experienced programmer on other languages, the first part is somehow a bit of waste of time. It takes a time before the book asks you for doing real code, and for the impatient this is a real draw back. But if it is your first contact with languages like Python or Perl, this is a good book.

Mark Lutz's LEARNING PYTHON, 3RD EDITION covers the latest edition of Python and includes tips on the program's built-in object types, statements, functions, modules, exceptions and more. College-level collections strong in programming languages in general and Python in particular will appreciate the coverage, written by the world leader in Python training and author of many previous writings on Python since 1992.

This book is a very good starting point for new Python users. It is direct and easy to follow. I was happy to see that the 3rd edition was in print dealing with the latest 2.5 version of Python.

I am really impressed by the 3rd edition of Mark Lutz's "Learning Python" book. It's a comprehensive introduction to the language. If you already know another programming language, you'll be able to jump in anywhere and get a quick working exposure to Python. If you are completely new to programming, the author starts slowly and moves at a steady, manageable pace. He provides all that you'll need to know in order to write and run programs.

I believe "Learning Python" would work great as a standard text book in college comp sci programs. It is a great exploration of the Python language and the best introduction I've seen covering how to actually build something more complicated in the real world than "hello world".

I'm a big fan of Ruby, but reading this new 3rd edition opens my eyes to what I've been missing by not doing more with Python. I've looked at other Python books in the past and none of them made Python really interesting. This book does.

I've been thinking about what language to teach someone totally new to programming - my kids, for instance, or college students just starting into programming . Python is a strong candidate and this book would be an ideal teaching aid.

One of the "pedagogical" things I like about Python (and Lutz's book) is how clearly you can see the influence and ancestry of C and C++. Lutz describes the steps that have been taken to improve Python into a more productive programming tool without giving up the power.This opens up an interesting line of discussion into the dynamic and evolutioary history of programming languages.

This is a big book. I'm only part way through the 600+ pages. You won't sit down and breeze through it in an afternoon. However, you'll quickly get well past "Hello World" and gain a good feeling for the language. I found it easy to skip ahead to some of the later chapters that interest me; they stand well on their own.

If you are curious about Python, this book will give you all the start-up skills you'll need.

I'm an experienced C/C++ developer and needed to pick up python in a hurry for work. I ended up buying several python books to make sure I had all my bases covered. I've come to appreciate this book a lot.

It does two things very well. First, it gives you a good overview of the language. You can read the book front to back and it has a nice progression. You'll certainly know the basics if you do that.

Second, and probably more importantly, for those of us too impatient to read a book cover-to-cover, it serves as an excellent reference for beginners. When I started out there were all the little noob things that I found myself constantly having to look up. Like "how do you specify a comment?" or "how do you structure and if-block?" or "how to you get a substring out of a string". Very basic questions like this that many python books don't bother with because apparently they are too basic.

If there is a weakness, it's just that this book is rather small and only covers the very basics. So reading this book alone will certainly not make you a mighty python programmer, or even give you enough info to probably write something interesting. But this book definitely deserves a place on your bookshelf if you are starting out and need the basics.

I took some time off of work, and I really wanted to just relax and goof off. I'd won a Safari subscription in the Perl Foundation auction, and I wanted to put it to use. I added Learning Python to my bookshelf and had at it.

It's hard to separate Learning Python from learning Python, but I'll do what I can: I felt the writing was a bit dry. It didn't flow the way the Camel and Llama books did, and the attempts to inject humor were really awkward. For example, the author is excited to explain that Python is named after Monty Python, and that "foo" and "bar" are replaced with "spam" and "eggs." This sounds silly. In practice, it's distracting. My brain is used to reading code with foo and bar, and knows how to skip over them. "spam" and "eggs" makes it harder to read.

I guess this is trying to help me become familiar with Python culture, but it just bugged me.

Learning Python (the activity) made me realize that Python's most immediate failings were not the ones I'd heard bandied about. The whitespace thing has serious ramifications, but it wasn't keeping me from coding quickly. Instead, I found that the lambda syntax and statement/expression division in Python really, really got in the way.

The book didn't see this as a problem. It didn't even seem interested in acknowledging that some people thought it was a problem. It just said "lambdas are anonymous functions! Isn't that great?"* and moved on.

One of the best programming language books I've read was AppleScript: The Definitive Guide. The thing that made it a great book was the author's willingness to say, "Look, this is where the language is most insane and horrible." If the authors think that Python is always great, they should at least provide explanations of what pitfalls are avoided by the constraints that leave many outsiders grimacing.

In the end, I learned enough Python in a week to get through all the exercises and then refactor some goofy code I had inherited, confident of what I was doing. Considering that I was also relaxing, drinking beer, and playing video games through that whole week, I think the book lived up to its job.

It just didn't convince me to convert.

(* OK, I'm paraphrasing.)

I am an experienced Perl and C programmer who wanted to try something new, and everyone raves about Python. The language itself is great -- but this book is awful. Here's the really short form of why I think so:
- The point of Python (or any programming language) is to do things, not to marvel at how cool the language is. Reading the book, you can't do anything other than toy programs until you're almost all the way through. That's 400+ pages of reading before you can do anything more interesting than basic operations.
- The book isn't concise -- quite the opposite. The authors marvel at the implementation details of the language at the very start -- which takes up many pages and isn't really relevant for the beginning python programmer.
I finally just went to the online python tutorial[...]it covered most of the same topics with a lot fewer words, and was less confusing to boot.
- The reason I buy books rather than just use online resources is to use the exercises as a method of forcing myself to learn the language in a structured fashion. The exercises in the book are trivially easy: they're not about thinking and understanding, but regurgitating what the book said. Because you're not doing any real work until the 400-page mark, you can't do anything really interesting in the exercises or on your own (if you're just reading the book).

I've read a lot of "Learning XXX" books. This is by far the worst.

My recommendation is to skip this book and go straight to the online tutorial. You'll save trees, money, and time.

Learning Python is an efficient way to learn python if you are familiar with one or more other programming languages. The book does a nice job of comparing and contrasting python's qualities with those of other languages (C++ and Java in particular) and provides many concise examples that highlight specific features well. For me, Learning Python was a great way to get going with software development in python.

If you are fairly new to programming, however, this book probably isn't for you. The first few parts try to be a more general introduction to programming, but they aren't enough for those truly new to programming languages. As an experienced developer, you will likely skim through the first few parts of this book quickly.

It's also not an exhaustive reference manual, and with Python 2.5 now released the book is getting a bit dated. But the core language features have not changed much, and there is plenty of online material describing that changes since version 2.2/2.3 that this book is based on.

The title of this book says it all: "Learning Python" is a great book to read if you want to learn Python. Granted, Python is not the hardest language in the world to learn, and I'm not sure that this book goes into enough detail about Python's trickier features (generators, anonymous functions, etc.). Still, I was able to sit down, read this book, work through the examples, and walk away feeling like I really knew how to develop software in Python. Most learn-a-language books are too dense for you to learn the language from the book alone, but "Learning Python" definitely made it as easy as possible.

This book spends a LONG time going over some of the fundamental concepts of programming. Although it does include very thorough coverage of the Python language itself, it suffers in many places from not knowing who its target audience is. For example, there are many comparisons made between Python and Java (and even C); however, one would assume that anybody with even a passing familiarity with another language knows what a "variable" is or that you shouldn't type the "c:\python22> " part when following along with the examples. If this demeanor was limited to the first few chapters, it might not have bothered me, but throughout the book, the authors can't seem to figure out if they're talking to experienced programmers or people who need to be reminded where the "on switch" is. Chapter 19, for example, is 12 full pages of "the concepts of Object-Oriented programming".

However, it's worth slogging through page after page of intro to programming material to get to the discussions on some of Python's advanced features, which they do cover well. I had previously tried learning Python from the online tutorial and although I made some progress, I could tell I was missing some concepts. After reading this book, I feel like I understand the "Python philosophy" - a few days ago, I wrote "datetime.date( *[ int( x ) for x in token.split( '-' ) ] )" in a program - on purpose! (That creates a date object from a string in the form "2007-05-13", if you're curious).

If you've got a reasonable amount of programming experience, you might want to start with "Python in a Nutshell" instead, though; as well written as this book is, it could have been two-thirds as long and still contained all the information I needed from it.