FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Python is an interpreted, interactive, object-oriented programming language. It incorporates modules, exceptions, dynamic typing, very high level dynamic data types, and classes. Python combines remarkable power with very clear syntax. It has interfaces to many system calls and libraries, as well as to various window systems, and is extensible in C or C++. It is also usable as an extension language for applications that need a programmable interface. Finally, Python is portable: it runs on many Unix variants, on the Mac, and on PCs under MS-DOS, Windows, Windows NT, and OS/2.

I had extensive experience with implementing an interpreted language in the ABC group at CWI, and from working with this group I had learned a lot about language design. This is the origin of many Python features, including the use of indentation for statement grouping and the inclusion of very-high-level data types (although the details are all different in Python).

The language comes with a large standard library that covers areas such as string processing (regular expressions, Unicode, calculating differences between files), Internet protocols (HTTP, FTP, SMTP, XML-RPC, POP, IMAP, CGI programming), software engineering (unit testing, logging, profiling, parsing Python code), and operating system interfaces (system calls, filesystems, TCP/IP sockets). Look at the table of contents for the Library Reference to get an idea of what's available. A wide variety of third-party extensions are also available. Consult the Python Package Index to find packages of interest to you.

Python versions are numbered A.B.C or A.B. A is the major version number -- it is only incremented for really major changes in the language. B is the minor version number, incremented for less earth-shattering changes. C is the micro-level -- it is incremented for each bugfix release. See PEP 6 for more information about bugfix releases.

Not really. You can do anything you want with the source, as long as you leave the copyrights in and display those copyrights in any documentation about Python that you produce. If you honor the copyright rules, it's OK to use Python for commercial use, to sell copies of Python in source or binary form (modified or unmodified), or to sell products that incorporate Python in some form. We would still like to know about all commercial use of Python, of course.

The source distribution is a gzipped tar file containing the complete C source, LaTeX documentation, Python library modules, example programs, and several useful pieces of freely distributable software. This will compile and run out of the box on most UNIX platforms.

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A whole bunch of stuff.

Ed.