Python
From AIMSWiki
Python is a scripting language and is widely used in scientific (and other) computing. You can find the official web site at http://www.python.org/.
This collection of pages serves as a reference to the Python language and some of its many extensions.
Note: to view the "at AIMS" links below (for faster, local access at AIMS) you have to type "about:config" in firefox, set "security.checkloaduri" to false, and then restart firefox. And be at AIMS, of course.
| Table of contents |
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Introduction to Python
- Basic data types
- Operators on the basic data types
- Flow control
- Functions
- Working with matrices and vectors
- [Python Bibliotheca - Educational materials for teachers and students (http://www.ibiblio.org/obp/pyBiblio/)]
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Modules for Scientific Computing
- Gnuplot: Vector Fields are included!
- Image: Used to create, load and save images
- math
- random: Functions for random numbers and sequences
- SciPy: Scientific tools
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Integrated Development Environments
- IPython, an ehanced interactive python shell with excellent help and autocompletion On the web (http://ipython.scipy.org/doc/manual/index.html) and [file:///usr/share/doc/ipython-common/manual/index.html at AIMS].
- GEdit (http://www.gnome.org/projects/gedit/) and its python plugins (http://raphael.slinckx.net/blog/index.php/2005-09-09/gedit-python-plugins)
- Your favourite editor not listed above
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Other documentation
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Reference material
- Official Python Documentation on the web (http://docs.python.org/) and [file:///usr/share/doc/python/html/index.html at AIMS]
- Community maintained Python Wiki (http://wiki.python.org/moin/)
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Tutorials, references and books focusing on science
- Roger Fearick's tutorial [file:///usr/local/doc/python/Roger_Fearick_python_intro.pdf at AIMS only]
- Hans Petter Langtangen's Python Scripting for Computational Science ["file:///usr/local/doc/python/TCSE3_ISBN_3-540-43508-5_2004.pdf" at AIMS] or on the web (http://heim.ifi.uio.no/~hpl/scripting/)
- Python and Scientific Computing (http://amath.colorado.edu/faculty/fperez/python/scicomp/), Fernando Perez' web page.
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Generic tutorials, books and references
- How to Think Like a Computer Scientist
- Second edition, English
- Second edition, as html (http://ibiblio.org/obp/thinkCS/python/english2e/html/index.html)
- First edition, English (April 2002)
- [file:///usr/local/doc/python/thinkCSpy.pdf PDF file at AIMS] | PDF file on the web (http://greenteapress.com/thinkpython/thinkCSpy.pdf)
- Translations
- Python en Francais, enorme, 370 pages! python_notes.pdf (http://www.aims.ac.za/~mackay/python/python_notes.pdf)
- Translations into Portuguese, Spanish, German, Italian (http://greenteapress.com/thinkpython/)
- Second edition, English
- A Byte of Python (http://www.byteofpython.info/)
- Dive Into Python on the web (http://www.diveintopython.org/) or [file:///usr/share/doc/diveintopython/html/index.html at AIMS]
- Instant Python on the web (http://www.hetland.org/python/instant-python.php)
- Thinking in Python (http://www.mindview.net/Books/TIPython)
- A (large) set of slides (http://www.ferg.org/python_slides/handouts.html)
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GUI (Graphical User Interface) programming
- wxPython (simple, cross platform GUI programming in Python)
- Getting Started (http://wiki.wxpython.org/index.cgi/Getting_20Started) (No need to install at AIMS; this has already been done. If you know programming, and you know python, you can skip to this section (http://wiki.wxpython.org/index.cgi/Getting_20Started#head-bc009992ceb90dddb7eb3db953e25d1792da2cdd)
- wxPython website (http://www.wxpython.org/), wiki (http://wiki.wxpython.org/), and CookBook (http://wiki.wxpython.org/index.cgi/wxPython_20Cookbook)
- From another source, a short example (http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/library/l-wxpy/)
- A simple GUI programming assignment with examples (http://www.aims.ac.za/~mackay/python/switches/)
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Imaging and graphics
- Python Imaging Library Handbook (http://www.pythonware.com/library/pil/handbook/index.htm)
- PyX - Python Graphics Package on the web (http://pyx.sourceforge.net/manual/index.html) or [file:///usr/share/doc/python-pyx-doc at AIMS]
- VPython (http://wiki.aims.ac.za/mediawiki/index.php/Vpython) - python programming language including the 3D graphic module Visual (http://vpython.org/webdoc/visual/index.html) (plotting and animations)
- For 2D plotting, there are matplotlib (http://matplotlib.sourceforge.net/) and gnuplot (http://wiki.aims.ac.za/mediawiki/index.php/Gnuplot) (including 3D plotting)
- To add: mayavi
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Text processing
- Text Processing in Python (http://gnosis.cx/TPiP/)
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