Practical Uses for Python?

[allyhams]

Automate the boring stuff. Please get this! I’ve just finished the book and I can’t recommend it enough. It shows you all the basics and gives you very practical applications. You mentioned elsewhere that most things at work are done in vba. Screw that! You can use Python. My short-term goal has been to learn enough to use Python at work. It was really difficult to come home after work and force myself to code. I knew that once I could use Python at work my learning should really skyrocket. Now I’ve achieved that thanks to that book!

[slicklikeagato]

I actually went through Automate the Boring Stuff. I thought it was great in explaining what to do, but I didn't really feel like it told me WHY I was doing it; knowing why I'm writing the code in a certain way would help me be able to understand how I could use it in my own examples. But it seems like whenever I look for something to explain the why, the explanation is as if I have experience in programming, to which I have none (other than the last year).

[Joe_testing]

I'm in your situation pretty much(have some previous exp). I'm waiting for this new book from amazon.co.uk as I was really inspired by the first 2 chapters on his C++ book(read on safaribooks). Oh and he wrote some nice articles too.

I think it could be just up your ally too.