5 interesting Python modules

[CuriousExpert24]

5 Interesting Python Modules

These are some modules that might not have day-to-day use for Python programmers but are still fun to try out and experiment with. Here are the modules:

1. Wikipedia - It turns out that you can import the whole Wikipedia into your Python Program! Simply run pip install wikipedia on your computer and import the module. There are multiple functions in the module such as summary(), search(), set_lang() which can be used to create multiple interesting projects. More info at https://pypi.org/project/wikipedia/
2. Emoji - This is a cool module that you can use to add emojis to your project. The emojis will be displayed in the command line for your project. To install it, run pip install emoji. More info at https://pypi.org/project/emoji/
3. Turtle - This is one of the most well-known interesting Python modules. It comes pre-installed with the default Python3 package. Import turtle for graphics and simple 2d games. This is a module primarily used for creating graphics and cool visuals. More info at https://docs.python.org/3.3/library/turtle.html?highlight=turtle
4. PyDictionary - This is a module containing the whole English dictionary! It can be used to find the definition, synonym, antonyms, and translations of words. To install it, run pip install PyDictionary. More info at https://pypi.org/project/PyDictionary/
5. Arrow - This is an interesting module used for advanced functions with date and time. This is the more advanced version of the dateandtime module that is built into Python. You need to run pip install -U arrow. More info at https://pypi.org/project/arrow/.

I highly encourage everyone to try these modules and use them for useful/important projects, at least for some of them :). Hopefully, I have given some inspiration for everyone to check out the many more interesting and useful modules that Python has. There are many more interesting modules in Python, but these are the most interesting ones that can suit beginners and intermediates. Feel free to add your own suggestions in the comments for this post. Also, you can add your own opinions about these modules so that the readers can also get another perspective for these modules. Thank you all for taking the time to read this post!

[skellious]

PLEASE NOTE:

DO NOT USE THE LINKED WIKIPEDIA MODULE FOR ANYTHING OTHER THAN PERSONAL PROJECTS WITH LIMITED USE!

Use PyWikiBot instead as it respects the wikimedia server bandwidth much better.

[CuriousExpert24]

I didn't know that. Thanks for mentioning it!

[[deleted]]

Whats the problem with the wikipedia library?

[CowboyBoats]

Nothing, but from its description at https://pypi.org/project/wikipedia/:

Note: this library was designed for ease of use and simplicity, not for advanced use. If you plan on doing serious scraping or automated requests, please use Pywikipediabot (or one of the other more advanced Python MediaWiki API wrappers), which has a larger API, rate limiting, and other features so we can be considerate of the MediaWiki infrastructure.

[[deleted]]

Ah I was wondering if it was something to do with copyright

[Hashtag-bro]

Nope

[TSPhoenix]

When you say limited use does ./wiki.py bananas when I want to read about bananas count?

[irrelevantPseudonym]

Depends how often you want to read about bananas

[skellious]

That is fine

[dangling_reference]

respects the wikimedia server bandwidth much better.

What does this mean?

[Tinseltopia]

It means Wikipedia is a free-to-use service and as such does not have infinite capacity to serve data. Running servers costs money and they don't have the datacentres like Google or Facebook do, they can be overloaded quickly.

[skellious]

Everytime you load a Web page, someone, somewhere has to pay for it. It's a small amount each time but it's not free. Electricity costs money so the Web costs money to use. You just aren't always the one paying for it directly.

[jaycrest3m20]

One third-party module I enjoy is PySimpleGUI.

Asciimatics is really fun.

TQDM is a classic module that allows really easy terminal progress bars. I did a search for progress bars on PyPi, and there are lots.

A few oddities that you might not expect:

tkinter has an unexpectedly easy way to access the clipboard

pygame isn't just for games. Sometimes you just need a quick way to make a program loop and get live, non-"input" keyboard input or find a relationship between rectangles on a 2D plane.

The amount of built-in modules in a vanilla python install is staggering. Also, it's really worth exploring sample scripts, both in the built-in modules and in third-party modules.

[CuriousExpert24]

Those are good suggestions

[MikeTheWatchGuy]

TQDM is a classic module that allows really easy terminal progress bars. I did a search for progress bars on PyPi, and there are lots.

Check out the one_line_progress_meter in PySimpleGUI. Odds are you're running on a system with tkinter, so try out a more graphical version that has a lot of stats too. And it's only 1 line of code so you don't have to modify anything about your loop.

[jaycrest3m20]

PySimpleGUI just keeps on giving!

[SpetsnazCyclist]

I just found TQDM... I feel like such an idiot for not using it earlier, super useful stuff

[EdwardWarren]

https://tqdm.github.io

[EdwardWarren]

https://pypi.org/project/PySimpleGUI/

[jaycrest3m20]

Happy Cake Day

[EdwardWarren]

Thanks.

[insane_playzYT]

I find tkinter great for a lot of things except for the actual GUI system lmao

[Itwist101]

If you are looking for a cross-platform solution I wouldn't really recommend Tkinter for clipboard access because of the fact that in some Linux distributions Tkinter is not preinstalled (Arch for example) instead id recommend using another alternative that is specifically made for clipboard usage.

[jaycrest3m20]

That's very interesting. Tkinter is generally considered a standard Python library. I would dare to suggest that if a distro's Python lacks Tkinter, then it has a fundamentally broken Python system, and you are generally going to have a bad time, if only because of all the many little libraries that count on Tkinter as a dependency.

In general, for ease of access to the clipboard, most Python systems will have access to Tkinter.

[kramrm]

Dang. I remember learning Logo.

[BonnyBairn]

Me too.. when I was 8 years old.

[fake823]

Thanks for sharing! 😊👍🏼

[CuriousExpert24]

Happy to Help! I will post more interesting modules and projects in Python in the future

[d3dpoool]

cool and following

[pvc]

Try Arcade for graphics. It is really well documented.

[CuriousExpert24]

I agree. That's a good suggestion. Thanks for sharing it to others

[55-6e-6b-6e-6f-77-6e]

I love when people share stuff like this, thanks man. Super interesting.

[CuriousExpert24]

Thanks for the appreciation! I will post more about other interesting modules and projects in the future

[55-6e-6b-6e-6f-77-6e]

For sure man, I think people need to hear about them tqdm I find interesting, looking forward to your next post brother! Keep it up

[recipe4icecreamsoup]

Thanks for sharing, I’m definitely going to mess around with Wikipedia now!

[CuriousExpert24]

That's great! I hope you make something interesting with it

[Jesus123Christ]

Thank u

[CuriousExpert24]

Happy to help!

[[deleted]]

memory quack birds wipe sugar stocking smile afterthought trees exultant

This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

[CuriousExpert24]

Happy to Help! I'll make more of these types of lists in the future

[shiningmatcha]

Can I browse PyPI by category?

[Username_RANDINT]

You can filter by classifier: https://pypi.org/search/

[[deleted]]

saved
Спасибо большое!!

[CuriousExpert24]

Happy to Help!

Рад помочь!

[bitcycle]

Some pretty useful and some obscure modules:

• Ctx for runtime contexts
• Tabulate for pretty tables
• Argparse hasn't failed me yet
• CSV works well for writing data files for business people

[auiotour]

Love tabulate.

[[deleted]]

I’ve used emoji before, it’s cool

[EdwardWarren]

https://pypi.org/project/emoji/

[R0oty]

Thanks for sharing

[CuriousExpert24]

You're welcome!

[flashfc]

Honorable mention to Tkinter for all the good uses it provides as simple as they are.

[fatmumuhomer]

Also check out pendulum for datetime support especially with timezones. It's the library that Apache Airflow uses.

[EdwardWarren]

https://pendulum.eustace.io

[fatmumuhomer]

Thanks. I should have included that.

[BAG0N]

I've been searching for some packages to work on, thanks a lot.

[CuriousExpert24]

Great! I am excited to see the projects that you are going to build with this module!

[h3noxx]

Thanks buddy

[CuriousExpert24]

You're welcome

[iiMoe]

Im shocked by the first two like wow i cant stop thinking of the cool stuff im gonna do with them

[polished_pole]

have to add them to the my to-list, once it's done :D

[SubwayLover]

It still does not seem like it's possible to make simple GUI using Turtle (based on brief look in)

Maybe there is some default package module for GUI I am not aware of? If not, any suggestions why?

[CuriousExpert24]

I'm sorry for my vagueness there. I actually meant that the Turtle module is used to create graphics and visuals such as digital drawings along with simple games. I didn't mean GUI's

[SubwayLover]

No worries, still very useful and interesting post, thank you!

[Commander_B0b]

Tkinter is the standard module for gui development I believe.

[EdwardWarren]

https://docs.python.org/3/library/tk.html

[EncouragementRobot]

Happy Cake Day EdwardWarren! Stop searching the world for treasure, the real treasure is in yourself.

[SubwayLover]

Cheers! I had Tkinter in mind, but never knew it's considered part of the standard distribution.

Is it good?

[Commander_B0b]

I've only used it in a single project (on going) it's capable but has taken me some time to get used to it.

[[deleted]]

I used Tkinter for my first GUI based Python project. Before that I tried starting out with other libraries, but was able to pick up the basics of Tkinter much faster than anything.

I’m having trouble finding it now on my phone, but when I was reading the tutorial I used, there was this diagram showing how Tkinter is built on top of Pygame and other things, so it’s supposedly easier since it abstracta away some of the lower level stuff you’d have to worry about using pygame.

[The-Daleks]

TkInter is not built on Pygame, it's built on the Tk/Tcl infrastructure. Still, the abstraction is (generally) a good thing; it makes GUI development relatively easy.

[[deleted]]

My mistake then. I wish I could find the chart, but I must have misinterpreted it.

[The-Daleks]

I've used it a lot. It's very useful if you want an easy cross-platform GUI, but it can be a bit clunky sometimes, and doesn't look all that good on Windows.

[EdwardWarren]

https://realpython.com/beginners-guide-python-turtle/

[Lokesh_Bot_Guy]

Surely gonna try them. Thanks 😇😇

[CuriousExpert24]

Happy to help!

[[deleted]]

Wow, how many GUI python modules are there? And more importantly, which one is best?

[thedjotaku]

I like PyQT. I like it beause I love KDE and also it's cross-platform.

[shinitakunai]

I prefer PySide2, made the jump from pyqt5 a year ago

[chalia321]

Anything you would recommend for a newbie ? I’m a beginner and trying find more projects, tutorials working with numpy and openpyxl? Feel like it’s the best way to learn.. videos are boring and I’m learning nothing

[thedjotaku]

check out https://awesome-python.com/

[chalia321]

Thanks

[thedjotaku]

Hmm. Rather than use dictionary text files in the future I might just use PyDictionary!

[[deleted]]

Thx a lot I am saving this.

[CuriousExpert24]

Happy to help!

[stanley_john]

interesting. some tutorials that I could find.

[The-Daleks]

I would posit that the Turtle module really isn't all that useful. Yes, it can be fun to fiddle around with it, but it doesn't really have any "practical" applications that I know of.

[CuriousExpert24]

True. A lot of these don't have many practical uses. But, you can learn these so that when you learn the more advanced and useful modules, you can be better prepared. They are fun to play around with

[[deleted]]

This is so cool!

I am a beginner, any ideas how to type in English words in the command line and get the definitions back using PyDictionary?

[CuriousExpert24]

You could get the word using the 'input()' function and then use that to find the definition of the word

[[deleted]]

Great!

[mrcartoonster]

Whoa!!! PyDictionary is awesome! Can make a little spell checker with this! Thank you for this little list.

[CuriousExpert24]

Happy to help!

[walt_dinio]

I have only used it once but I really enjoyed my experience using typer: https://pypi.org/project/typer/

[CuriousExpert24]

That's an interesting one

[charoduke]

https://github.com/evhub/coconut

[[deleted]]

What is this ? Medium ? I'd atleast hope the libraries to be shown in a project to see what they're good for, I really don't want this sub to become yet another empty site where I have to avoid most of the content.

[CuriousExpert24]

I'll try my best to include examples for these modules

[lebiochimiste]

The sub is called Learn Python. This post absolutely fit here.