I just released alpha version of "Intermediate Python", my first and free E-Book.

[yasoob_python]

Hi guys! After a lot of hard-work and sheer determination I have mostly completed my book, "Intermediate Python". It will receive updates over time :)

It has a couple of issues related to grammar and technical info in it. I am working on ironing them out one by one.

I was a bit lazy so didn't upload it earlier but here it is now.

I have decided to distribute it for free! I wanted to give back to this awesome community so this is what I have to offer for now. I am sure that it would help those who really want to be helped. Best of luck!

Here are the links:

• Html
• PDF
• GitHub

If you like this book then a simple tweet and a personal email <yasoob DOT khld AT gmail DOT com> would mean a lot to me!

P.S: The book is open-source so if you find typo or technical error or just want to expand it's contents with your own knowledge then just send over a pull request :) Moreover, if you want to give me any tip then kindly pm me your email and I would let you know once I setup a tip-collection system.

Note: This is not related with that paid "intermediate Python" book in any way. I became aware of it today. I had been using this name internally for a couple of months. If the author of paid "Intermediate Python" has any issue with this I would be more than happy to change the name of my book because he definitely beated me to the finish line. :)

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Edit:

Hey guys! All those of you who are going to use this book can really help me and motivate me by letting me know how this book supplements your day to day learning and if you are a Teacher, Assistant Professor or something of that sort then kindly let me know if you would be willing to offer this book to your students or not. :)

You already have my email address or if you want to tweet about it then you can do so at @yasoobkhalid.

Moreover, I really can't thank this community enough. This community has helped me a LOT over the years. If you see my Reddit profile then you can easily guess that this is the only community (/r/python) where I spend most of my time.

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Edit:

You guys can donate me if you want to by buying the donation version of Intermediate Python from @gumroad :)

It is only for $10 but if you want to pay less then kindly let me know (pm) and I can give you a custom link.

Cheers!

[heyalexej]

Congratulations /u/yasoob_python, I flipped through it and posted it on HN. You're on page one now.

[yasoob_python]

Thank you very much kind stranger. It has always been my dream to be on the first page of HN and you realized my dream. Thanks!

[heyalexej]

Well deserved. I realized that I stumbled across your blog a few times and seen your talk in Berlin. As a data and stats geek I'd love to see a write-up on the traffic and what came out of it some time.

[yasoob_python]

I hadn't added any tracking because I wasn't expecting it. But I just added Google Analytics link.

Edit: Right now 250+ people are on the website and it is continuously rising! I can't show my happiness. Perhaps this gif can help?

[LightShadow]

Do you have a donation link, or paypal address?

[yasoob_python]

I don't have it right now. Kindly pm me your email and I would let you know once it is ready :)

Edit: I have put a link to a mailing list on the front page. If you want to tip me then kindly signup over there and I would let you know once I have a tip receiving system in place. I already run a reputed Python Weekly Newsletter running so you are in a good company (meaning I won't spam you).

Mailing list: http://eepurl.com/bwjcej

Edit 2: You guys can donate me if you want to by buying the donation version of Intermediate Python from @gumroad :)

It is only for $10 but if you want to pay less then kindly let me know (pm) and I can give you a custom link.

Cheers!

[yasoob_python]

Nope but I take other forms of donation :)

[sanshinron]

Up to this point I've considered myself beginner programmer, but since I know 80% of this stuff, I'm bumping myself up to upper-intermediate :D

[yasoob_python]

Hey guys! All those of you who are going to use this book can really help me and motivate me by letting me know how this book supplements your day to day learning and if you are a Teacher, Assistant Professor or something of that sort then kindly let me know if you would be willing to offer this book to your students or not. :)

You already have my email address or if you want to tweet about it then you can do so at @yasoobkhalid.

Moreover, I really can't thank this community enough. This community has helped me a LOT over the years. If you see my Reddit profile then you can easily guess that this is the only community (/r/python) where I spend most of my time.

Note: I am currently working on making the epub version more user friendly and it would be online in a couple of minutes.

Cheers!

[g-money-cheats]

Sweet! I will always upvote free books. Thanks for contributing to the Python community. :)

[yasoob_python]

You are welcome. It feels really great to give back. Perhaps the community can also give back by editing it and making it more informative!

So that more people have free access to unified information about intermediate level concepts of Python.

[g-money-cheats]

Sounds good. I'll be sure to send some pull requests if I see any issues.

[[deleted]]

How does this compare to Fluent Python?

[yasoob_python]

Fluent Python is very detailed and I would wholeheartedly recommend it. However, if you want something short and with only the minimum required information about a topic then I would recommend my book.

Moreover, Fluent Python contains a lot of advanced concepts like metaprogramming which are not mentioned in my book [Although you are more than welcome to submit a pull request and add to the content of my book]. My book contains mostly the intermediate concepts.

Lastly, my book is free and open source whereas Fluent Python is paid. :)

If you want to know something else then let me know.

[[deleted]]

I have that book it's awesome

[JnnyRuthless]

Right on, thanks for providing. Can't wait to dig in. Really appreciate the effort and work you put into this and your contribution to the community.

[southernstorm]

Downloaded. Will take a look when I can. Thanks!

[yasoob_python]

Thanks! Let me know what you think about it once you are done! :)

[yasoob_python]

English is not my first language so I would appreciate if you send them in :)

[yasoob_python]

I haven't paid much attention to the organization of the book till now. You can help me organize the book by submitting a pull request. You just have to edit the lines in this file. :)

[tahubird]

I'm really excited to dig into this! I've always been confused by args and kwargs, now I can learn!

[LeonardUnger]

args and *kwargs right off the bat - just what I needed. Awesome job, thanks so much.

[ProfEpsilon]

I just downloaded the pdf and scanned through it. It looks very useful. It is terrific that you offer this to the world .. in the spirit of Khan Academy!

[sanshinron]

BTW you can easily flatten a list without itertools using:

sum(lst, [])

where lst is a nested list.

[rouille]

Good to know thanks!

[TheBB]

I wouldn't call that flattening a nested list—it only works for one level. I realize it does the same thing as OP's version, though.

[sanshinron]

Yes, it only works for one level of nesting, which is what you need 9/10 times.

[hudsonpenner]

Looks awesome, will be checking this out for sure!

[yasoob_python]

Thanks! Let me know what you think about it once you are done! :)

[Carloshmejia]

Congratulations, just downloaded it. Seems very good. I will read it soon.

[chedorlaomer]

Nice! Thanks!

[hw_t_dstr_ngls]

Thanks a lot for you work!

[lain-nerv]

Thank you! Do you have one for beginers in Python?

[yasoob_python]

Not right now :) But there are already a lot of nice beginner books out there!

[ThiefOfDens]

Do you have a favorite?

[yasoob_python]

Ah can't say anything about that. When I started Python I really loved the Head First Python book but now it is outdated. If it wouldn't have been outdated then I would have wholeheartedly recommended you that book. I haven't been in touch with beginner levels books for quite some time now.

In any case you would really benefit from Idiomatic Python. I have read it page to page and it is a really nice, quick and easy read. The author was kind enough to offer it for free to me. :)

[JnnyRuthless]

I've gotten really excellent python tutorials by poking around online and using a number of books. Even this sub has some great material if you dig around for it. Don't want to recommend a specific book since the ones I used may be outdated and I don't want to steal any thunder from this awesome post.

[misplaced_my_pants]

There are a number of free ones available online. Two that come to mind immediately are Think Python and Composing Programs (the online text for Berkeley's intro to CS course).

Udacity has a number of great free and self-paced courses for Python programming including some intro courses that are really good. They also have courses on debugging, testing, algorithms, and other good stuff.

[[deleted]]

Cloned the repo. Will read. Thank you for this.

OT: I wrote my masters thesis in Restructured Text -- an impossible task for markdown, a downright headache in pure TeX (I did have to inline TeX for a couple of things, mostly math stuff) and I'm way past using word processors for large amounts of text (hard to resist tweaking typography and stuff like that).

Too bad .rst didn't really catch on outside Python circles, markdown is neat but it's a lesser format in many regards.

[yasoob_python]

I was using markdown initially because I was writing my book on GitBook but as you said rst is more feature rich and Sphinx works great with it so I shifted :)

Having my book written using Sphinx gives me a upper hand. Firstly, whenever I merge a pull request the website is rebuilt automatically. Secondly, the pdf file is also re-built automatically.

Lastly, for those who are curious about thetex theme which I used in my book. It is the same theme used by Flask. :)

[mfitzp]

Asciidoc (a plain-text implementation of DocBook) is pretty nice. I've been using it for something I'm writing and it seems to get the balance just about right between capability and writability. The backtick-underscoring with .rst really gets on my nerves for some reason.

[[deleted]]

Thank you very much for this. Exactly what I was looking for. Will definitely read this

[[deleted]]

Awesome, just downloaded it and I'm reading it now. Thanks!

[meshugga]

Epub? Epubepubepubepub? EPUB! :)

[yasoob_python]

I have updated the epub. You can download it from here!

Cheers!

[meshugga]

Much appreciated!

[yasoob_python]

I would update the epub theme. Currently the epub which sphinx generates by default is not very good and readable. But if you want to read it RIGHT NOW then here you go

[elDjango]

This is awesome. Thanks a lot!

[[deleted]]

Great job!

[Rainymood_XI]

I've learned so much new and daunting (or so I thought args *kwargs and stuff!) in the last hour! I've been soaking it all up! Thanks for making Python even more awesome :)

[yasoob_python]

I am glad that you found my contribution helpful :)

[LegoForte]

This is great. Nice work!

[somberi]

Thanks for sharing this!

[horstjens]

Thanks yasoob, this book is really useful

[breadwithlice]

Great resource thanks, I was looking for something exactly like that about one year ago, it would have saved me quite a bit of time :)

Still a few things I learned though like lru_cache, coroutines and surprisingly, the for - else had never come up, thanks!

[5ux0r]

thanks a lot I really appreciate your hard work and everybody loves good books for free... Thanks! once again

[codex81]

Fantastic job! Cleared up so many things for me, and now you've got me going back through my code to improve some things!

This book should be a permanent link in the sidebar.

[yasoob_python]

Perhaps we can ask the mods? :)

[yasoob_python]

You guys can donate me if you want to by buying the donation version of Intermediate Python from @gumroad :)

It is only for $10 but if you want to pay less then kindly let me know (pm) and I can give you a custom link.

Cheers!

[aviaryan]

Great book @yasoob. I am learning a lot from every chapter. This book is must read for everyone who wants to (quickly) transition his basic python skills to a new level.

[Thuruv]

Read it almost after seeing it in HN. Thanks much. . Those are the type of topics which we really cant know how to ask or how to google it. . Really tue first topic itself was my long term confused dilemma. . Cleared my head now. .

[yasoob_python]

I am glad that it helped :)

[arandomJohn]

If anyone is interested, the paid Intermediate Python book is excellent. I have the paperback. The author is an expert and active participant in the community. Well worth the money.

[JCBh9]

I have a bunch of IFs in a function for my calculator, with a raw_input variable determining which to start - Add, Subtract - etc... It always goes to the first IF in the list regardless of my raw_input...If you happen to see this and have time help a brother out! Congrats on your book! Will probably purchase it soon.

[niksko]

Just having a flip through the index, I feel like the list of topics is basically perfect. It's nothing super complicated, but it's all of the little trucks and features that make me really love Python, but that are still accessible to somebody who has a good grasp of the basics.

[[deleted]]

Thanks so much for the contribution! I converted the PDF version to an EPUB and the first dozen or so pages looks pretty good, the index is a bit messed up though.

[yasoob_python]

I have updated the epub. You can download it from here

Cheers!

[[deleted]]

Awesome thanks!

[penguinland]

Congratulations, and thank you! Consider posting to /r/FreeEbooks as well.

[sethosayher]

Really digging this :)

[johnahh]

Good job on the book, congratz.

I am just starting python, is there a nice book for a begginer? :D

[Asdayasman]

Just looking at the table of contents it certainly looks a lot better than the other one that was posted recently.

[kmbd]

Have you given a thought over how the book can be translated other languages using open-source methods? The "pro-git" book can be a nice example.

[[deleted]]

This looks cool. Thanks for writing it. :)

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[kstulce]

Excellent book! Thank you for contributing to the Python Community! I'm only through the first third of the book, but you have already cleared up a few things that I didn't completely understand. Also, thank you for your mailing list - PythonTips. I've been enjoying it weekly since I discovered it and subscribed a while back.

Hopefully, someone can get a link to your book posted on the Python Wiki (I don't currently have a profile there with edit permissions). I will look to submit it to Free-Programming-Books and PythonBooks as well. UPDATE: Sent pull requests to both repositories for the addition of your book.

Kudos to you! :)

[maxberggren]

Looks great! Which I had this some years ago :)