@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

dabeaz

@dabeaz@mastodon.social

Free-range computer scientist living in Evanston, Illinois. Former academic. I teach computer science courses, but you'll probably find me yapping on about bikes, dogs, and other random stuff here. I wrote the Python Cookbook, 3rd Ed (O'Reilly) and Python Distilled (Addison-Wesley). Teaching CSCI 1730, Design and Implementation of Programming Languages at Brown.edu in Fall 2023!

This profile is from a federated server and may be incomplete. Browse more on the original instance.

dabeaz, to random
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

There's something deeply sublime about cycling in a warm summer downpour. You know it's going to be a messy affair so you lean into it. You bike just a little bit faster. You splash through every huge puddle. Wave to the cars. Give a nod to the lone crazy jogger you encounter. Grinning ear-to-ear all the way back home.

dabeaz, to random
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

I've been thinking about releasing my old "Advanced Python Mastery" course (last taught in 2018) as some kind of creative-commons thing like I did for one of my other courses, but I'm not sure I actually see the point.

I mean, sure, you could read this and learn about "features" that can still be used. However, what passes for "Advanced" Python has changed a lot and not in a way that makes me want to update material. So, I don't know.

Maybe the most advanced Python is simple Python.

dabeaz,
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

Eh, maybe I could just release it "as is" with no modifications or anything else at all--just the slide deck and exercises as they were when the course was offered. A giant 600-page slide-deck PDF is not necessarily the most friendly format though.

jasongorman, to random
@jasongorman@mastodon.cloud avatar

If musicians were devs:

"I'm a Fender Stratocaster player, with 10 years' experience playing major chords, minor chords, 7th chords,, the major scale in A, E and D, the blues scale in A, E and D (see my leetnote and shredderrank profiles for all the scales and chords I know). My tech stack experience includes Marshall Plexi and JCM amps, BOSS Blues Driver (BD-2), EHX Memory Man, BOSS Chorus CE-2, Dunlop Cry Baby.

What kind of music do I play? I'm sorry. I don't understand the question."

dabeaz,
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

@jasongorman What about rests? Can you play rests?

dabeaz, to random
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

Wasn't planning for my upcoming talk to be a mashup of Raft, lambda-calculus, and category theory, but here we are. Hmmmm. This might prove freaky.

dabeaz,
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

@chmp I've only got 45 minutes. We'll see---this might be more of a "slide fury".

dabeaz, to random
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

Was just thinking about how much I've missed teaching the short-lived "Computer Science: The Good Parts" course that @jeffcohen and I put together back in 2018.

Having two back-to-back days where we built logic with actual hardware (breadboards, transistors, chips, etc.) one day followed by building everything again with lambda calculus the next day was an absolute mind-fuck. And in the best kind of way.

It's the kind sharp U-turn you can't pull off in almost any kind of normal course.

ve7fim, to random
@ve7fim@mastodon.social avatar

TFW a file format is so old that it includes an "insert paper tape this way" arrow as part of the header: Looks like this traces back to the PDP-11.

dabeaz,
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

@ve7fim Wait! What?!? Is THAT what the mysterious "RUBOUT" key is about?

faassen, to rust
@faassen@fosstodon.org avatar

Rust offers a lot of powerful features, and it can be overwhelming when you are learning it: what to use?

Rust becomes easier when you realize there is a smooth path. The smooth path involves having concrete structs and enums that own everything, no references. It involves not being too afraid of clone to maintain this.

You may need to leave that path for performance (references with explicit lifetimes, rc) and/or reuse (traits, generics, macros). But mostly you stay on the path.

dabeaz,
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

@jonstodle @soulsource @faassen I think my past experience with C was a major impediment to my first attempt at learning Rust with respect to references. If I regroup and return, I'm going to approach Rust differently I think.

chrism, to random
@chrism@chattingdarkly.org avatar

Every project is littered with the builds that always break, the confused contractor due to lack of docs, the essential magical box or code section that everyone is a afraid to touch, the occasional data corruption that goes uninvestigated, the massive list of chores that a new developer must complete to get developing.

Successful projects embrace each of these little things and make them nonissues over time. Say to yourself "yes, Chris, it really is going to be that hard" and just dig in.

dabeaz,
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

@chrism @fumanchu Where's my magic box?

swelljoe, to python
@swelljoe@mas.to avatar

is so exhausting. DeprecationWarning: 'crypt' is deprecated and slated for removal in Python 3.13. Despite there being no replacement in the standard library that can reasonably generate a Linux compatible SHA512 hashed password. hashlib won't do it, at least not without a lot more code than I can figure out. Googling it, I only find a lecture about SHA512 not being secure (it's fine with rounds=210000, according to OWASP). passlib is not in the standard library.

dabeaz,
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

@slott56 @diazona @swelljoe I don't know who started the "where packages go to die" meme, but batteries rock, dependencies suck.

sanityinc, to random
@sanityinc@hachyderm.io avatar

Walk-in lint roller closet for cat owners, like a sticky car wash for fur-covered humans

dabeaz,
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

@sanityinc Would this be at all like electroplating?

gvwilson, to random
@gvwilson@mastodon.social avatar

In conversation with a friend yesterday, they bemoaned the gentrification of Python—the way that the cute little programming language neighborhood of the 90s was now crowded with the condos and up-market chain coffee shops of type hints and async I/O. I'm now stuck thinking about Fortran as a sturdy blue-collar part of town where people are mostly older and repair their own cars but a few younger folk with tattoos who take welding very seriously think they've found heaven.

dabeaz,
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

@gvwilson It's not so much that the cozy neighborhood has added condos and chain coffee shops, but that it's been razed to build a shiny office tower that no-one wants to live in-- except for maybe managers.

onelson, to random
@onelson@mastodon.social avatar

Not even 30 seconds into the movie and there's a tornado full of sharks on screen.

dabeaz,
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

@onelson Has a professor made an appearance yet?

dabeaz, to random
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

Wait, the "E" in IDE isn't "Enshittifier?"

dabeaz, to random
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

Meanwhile, getting ready for the last day of Raft. Wondering if it will implode on the surface.

dabeaz, to random
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

Someone's running an obfuscated Python contest (https://pyobfusc.com). I should submit an entry that's simply:

print('Hello, World!')

And then just sit back and wryly smile.

dabeaz,
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

@midnitte No, obfuscated.

mpirnat, to random
@mpirnat@mas.to avatar

Today we had to say goodbye to our beloved cat, Julia, who made it nearly 19 years before it was her turn at the rainbow bridge. Please give your pets some extra love for us today.

dabeaz,
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

@mpirnat So sorry, Mike.

dabeaz, to random
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

I think the main advantage of being a Python expert is having a leg up on creating complex solutions to simple problems.

Dtl, to science
@Dtl@mastodon.social avatar

Scientists & others giving public talks, what do you do about social media on your intro slides now?

I just sat though several talks where people still gave twitter usernames. One person said they don't use twitter any more, but their name would tell you where they are on Mastodon.

What do we feel about this? Using a well known service as a change of address system.

I think I'll put my mastodon ID on my next talk. What about you?

dabeaz,
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

@Dtl I'm just going to put my website on slides going forward. Maybe my YouTube channel since that's where I post a lot of past conference talks.

sgillies, to random
@sgillies@mastodon.social avatar

Sam Alito is also corrupt as fuck? Nobody saw this coming. Nobody.

dabeaz,
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

@sgillies Can confirm.

raiderrobert, to python
@raiderrobert@mastodon.social avatar

Not entirely sure how I feel about getting structs:

https://snarky.ca/proposing-a-struct-syntax/

dabeaz,
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

@raiderrobert I'm okay with it as long as some other language feature gets deleted. Maybe enums.

dabeaz,
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

@raiderrobert Ok. Abstract base classes then! ;-).

dabeaz, to random
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

Meanwhile, getting ready for day 1 of Raft. Debating if I should try coding it in Java. Not joking.

dabeaz,
@dabeaz@mastodon.social avatar

Won't lie... coding Java in emacs with no tab-complete is making me question certain decisions.

  • All
  • Subscribed
  • Moderated
  • Favorites
  • •
  • JUstTest
  • cubers
  • DreamBathrooms
  • InstantRegret
  • tacticalgear
  • magazineikmin
  • Youngstown
  • thenastyranch
  • mdbf
  • slotface
  • rosin
  • modclub
  • kavyap
  • ethstaker
  • provamag3
  • osvaldo12
  • khanakhh
  • cisconetworking
  • Durango
  • everett
  • ngwrru68w68
  • Leos
  • normalnudes
  • GTA5RPClips
  • tester
  • megavids
  • anitta
  • lostlight
  • All magazines
    •