Impractical Python Projects: Playful Programming Activities to Make You Smarter Kindle Edition

There are 16 projects. To an intermediate Python developer, I think I would rather take the couple good ones from this book, and not look back.1/3 are programming interview questions that I could get from Hackerrank,Over 100 pages are page-filler space-math junk that is frankly arbitrary in terms of getting better at Python, and being spoon-fed pygame code over and over again.and 1/3 is genuinely interesting exercises (algorithms especially)

Great book! Imaginative stories provide a fun (and fascinating) purpose for each programming tip. The author pulls out all the stops with his ideas: Decoding Ciphers? Genetic Algorithms? Markov Chain Analysis? Marilyn vos Savant and Monte Carlo Simulation? Retirement planning I can understand? Fermi's Paradox and Modelling the Milky Way? Are you kidding me? Wow!I remember a cartoon from The New Yorker where a boss is telling an employee "I see you really put yourself into this report. Take it out immediately." On the contrary - the fact the author has used his fun stories to help me become more proficient at Python is a very effective tool. Please give us more!

I'm only roughly half way through all the projects in the book, but felt like writing a review since I am thoroughly enjoying my experience.The projects have not only help further develop my Python knowledge, they've also helped challenge my brain with good old fashioned everyday problems to solve. HIGHLY recommend going through the challenge projects.I would recommend this to any intermediate user - the author is correct in describing this as a great "next book" after you've completed a beginner's level one.

Interesting projects and a great blend of programming methods and mindset. Introduces useful production tools like pylint and logging. Code is readable and supported with good line-by-line descriptions. I've encountered no bugs in the listings through Chapter 9. Highly recommended.

cool projects, useful when trying to use python for engineering applications- probably the reason why the book is called "IMPRACTICAL applications...." but hey, learned a lot about python and then I went to MATLAB.

If you're learning Python then this is a good book for your library. I have several books from No Starch Press and they have all been good. I refer to the books often for reference purposes.

GREAT product if you are already familiar with the logic and syntax of Python. Would not recommend to someone who has never programmed in Python for. Otherwise, it is incredibly fun to work these problems!

Love this book. Delivery was quick.

I found the projects a good illustration for how with a little bit of code and some knowledge of 3rd party packages you can make something in a few hours that does some really neat stuff. Most projects I really enjoyed, however if you're using Mojave OSX you may have a problem with keyboard input for the pygame chapters

The author clearly knows his stuff.I'd recommend this book if you're struggling to find idea for coding.

I strongly believe that there are two groups of programmers:(1) Traditional algorithms and mathematically inclined(2) Data Science/Machine Learning and more statistics focusedIn a way, mathematics and statistics are opposites. The former is about precision while the later is about probabilities.Group (1) tends to love Hackerrank style projects, which are abundant in the first chapters of the book. I belong to group (2) – so take that into account in my review. Naturally, I don’t like the first couple of chapters.My Personal Highlights:Chapter 10: Are we alone? Astrobiology in Python!This chapter is my personal favorite! On page 192 he simulates the Milky Way, randomly distributes civilizations and uses the Euclidean distance to calculate the probability of detecting other civilizations. Wow, and all this in beautiful Python code. Mind-expanding!Chapter 11: The Monty Hall ProblemAlmost a cliché in interviews, but the author’s Monte Carlo Simulation is fantastic (I’m a huge fan) and probably one of the most beautiful pseudo code I’ve ever seen.Chapter 16: Benford’s LawIn compliance books, I’ve always found Bendford’s Law extremely boring and unclear, not so in this book. The Python code makes the concept extremely clear. For Tableau fans, Benford vs. Enron financial data (page 351) is fantastic.Highly recommended for any curios (Pythonian) programmer.

I am huge fan of No Starch Press, and I think their books fulfill the slogan "The Finest in Geek Entertainment".Vaughan's book is exactly what I've been looking for. After teaching myself python using edX's MIT Python course, Princeton Univ's Introduction to Programming in Python by Sedgewick & Wayne, I still wonder what could I do with python? Sedgewick's book is more academic, but it is the best reference in python for me. Vaughan's Impractical Python Projects elevates your understanding of python into the level of real-world practice. His codes are fine, though I am only in Chapter 6, there has been no problem at all, I could also modify the codes to print them in the way I want. I am not a big fan of Chapter 2 and Chapter 3 because Palingrams and Anagrams don't intrigue me very much. But, it's perfectly fine if you skip these two chapters and focus on decoding and encoding different ciphers in Chapter 4,5,6. The practices at the end of each chapter are very interesting, and equipped with solutions at the end of the book. But you have to do it in your own way. In the end, I find this book quite good for my use, and it's a straight 5 star.The design of the book's cover and content pages are also interesting. It's gonna fall apart when you bend the book too much, but it'll stick back together if you press them. So the overall book shape is well maintained after heavy use! Great design.

Fabulous book with really fun (math and games related) projects to undertake in Python. It is exactly what I hope it would be, and more.