#126 WebAssembly comes to Python

Sponsored by DigitalOcean: pythonbytes.fm/digitalocean

Special guest: Cecil Philip

Brian #1: Python Used to Take Photo of Black Hole

• Lots of people talking about this. The link I’m including is a quick write up by Mike Driscoll.
• From now on these conversations can happen:
  • “So, what can you do with Python?”
  • “Well, it was used to help produce the worlds first image of a black hole. Your particular problem probably isn’t as complicated as that, so Python should work fine.”
• Projects listed in the paper: “First M87 Event Horizon Telescope Results. III. Data Processing and Calibration”:
  • Numpy (van der Walt et al. 2011)
  • Scipy (Jones et al. 2001)
  • Pandas (McKinney 2010)
  • Jupyter (Kluyver et al. 2016)
  • Matplotlib (Hunter 2007).
  • Astropy (The Astropy Collaboration et al. 2013, 2018)

Cecil #2: Wasmer - Python Library for executing WebAssembly binaries

• WebAssembly (Wasm) enables high level languages to target a portable format that runs in the web
• Tons of languages compile down to Wasm but Wasmer enables the consumption of Wasm in python
• This enables an interesting use case for using Wasm as a way to leverage code between languages

Michael #3: Cooked Input

• cooked_input is a Python package for getting, cleaning, converting, and validating command line input.
• Name comes from input / raw_input (unvalidated) and cooked input (validated)
• Beginner’s can use the provided convenience classes to get simple inputs from the user.
• More complicated command line application (CLI) input can take advantage of cooked_input’s ability to create commands, menus and data tables.
• All sorts of cool validates and cleaners
• Examples

    cap_cleaner = ci.CapitalizationCleaner(style=ci.ALL_WORDS_CAP_STYLE)
    ci.get_string(prompt="What is your name?", cleaners=[cap_cleaner])

    >>>  ci.get_int(prompt="How old are you?", minimum=1)

    How old are you?: abc
    "abc" cannot be converted to an integer number
    How old are you?: 0
    "0" too low (min_val=1)
    How old are you?: 67
    67

Brian #4: JetBrains and PyCharm officially collaborating with Anaconda

• PyCharm 2019.1.1 has some improvements for using Conda environments.
  • Fixed various bugs related to creating Conda envs and installing packages into them.
• Special distribution of PyCharm: PyCharm for Anaconda with enhanced Anaconda support.
• I’m using PyCharm Pro with vim emulation this week to edit a notebook based presentation. I might run them in Jupyter, or just run it in PyCharm, but editing with all my normal keyboard shortcuts is awesome.

Cecil #5: Building a Serverless IoT Solution with Python Azure Functions and SignalR

• Interesting blog post on using serverless, IoT, real-time messaging to create a live dashboard
• Shows how to create a serverless function in Python to process IoT data
• There’s tons of DIY applications for using this technique at home
• The Dashboard is a static website using D3 for charting.

Michael #6: multiprocessing.shared_memory — Provides shared memory for direct access across processes

• New in Python 3.8
• This module provides a class, SharedMemory, for the allocation and management of shared memory to be accessed by one or more processes on a multicore or symmetric multiprocessor (SMP) machine.
• The ShareableList looks nice to use.

Extras

Brian:

• Getting ready for PyCon with STICKERS. Yeah, baby. Come see us at PyCon. I’ll also be bringing some copies of Python Testing with pytest, if anyone doesn’t already have a copy.
• Lots of interviews going on for Test & Code, and some will happen at PyCon.

Cecil:

• Attendee Detector Workshop
• Talk Python training app on Android

Michael:

• Guido van Rossum interviewed on MIT’s AI podcast via Tony Cappellini
• Visual Studio IntelliCode for VS & VS Code
• Showing a Craigslist scammer who's boss using Python via Dan Koster

Jokes

Brian: To understand recursion you must first understand recursion.

Michael: A programmer was found dead in the shower. Next to their body was a bottle of shampoo with the instructions 'Lather, Rinse and Repeat'.