The Python Podcast.init

By Tobias MaceyTechnology Education

The Python Podcast.init episodes

July 02, 2016BeeWare with Russell Keith-Magee
Summary
When you have good tools it makes the work you do even more enjoyable. Russel Keith-Magee has been building up a set of tools that are aiming to let you write graphical interfaces in Python and run them across all of your target platforms. Most recently he has been working on a capstone project called Toga that targets the Android and iOS platforms with the same set of code. In this episode we explored his journey through programming and how he has built and designed the Beeware suite. Give it a listen and then try out some or all of his excellent projects!
Brief Introduction
Hello and welcome to Podcast.__init__, the podcast about Python and the people who make it great.
I would like to thank everyone who has donated to the show. Your contributions help us make the show sustainable. For details on how to support the show you can visit our site at pythonpodcast.com
Linode is sponsoring us this week. Check them out at linode.com/podcastinit and get a $20 credit to try out their fast and reliable Linux virtual servers for your next project
We are also sponsored by Sentry this week. Stop hoping your users will report bugs. Sentry’s real-time tracking gives you insight into production deployments and information to reproduce and fix crashes. Check them out at getsentry.com and use the code podcastinit to get a $50 credit!
Visit our site to subscribe to our show, sign up for our newsletter, read the show notes, and get in touch.
To help other people find the show you can leave a review on iTunes, or Google Play Music, and tell your friends and co-workers
Join our community! Visit discourse.pythonpodcast.com for your opportunity to find out about upcoming guests, suggest questions, and propose show ideas.
Your hosts as usual are Tobias Macey and Chris Patti
Today we’re interviewing Russel Keith-Magee about the Beeware project, which is a collection of tools and libraries that are meant to be composed together for building up your Python development environment.
Interview with Firstname Lastname
Introductions
How did you get introduced to Python? – Chris
What is the BeeWare project and what goals do you have for it? – Tobias
What kinds of projects are contained under the BeeWare umbrella and what inspired you to start creating these kinds of tools? – Tobias
Did each project arise from a particular need that you had at the time or has there been a logical progression from one tool to the next? – Tobias
At PyCon US of this year (2016) you made a presentation about the work that you have been doing to bring Python to the iOS and Android platforms. Can you provide a high-level overview for anyone who hasn’t seen that talk yet? – Tobias
Let’s talk about Toga – how does Toga differ from some of the other cross platform UI framework efforts for various languages like Kivy or Shoes? – Chris
What are some of the biggest challenges that you had to overcome in order to get Python to run on both iOS and Android? – Tobias
How does runtime performance for applications written in Python compare with the same program running in the languages that are natively supported on those platforms? – Tobias
Can you walk us through the low level flow of a single toga API request? – Chris
Do you view your work on Toga and the associated libraries as a hobby project or do you think that it will turn into a production ready tool set that people will use for shipping applications? – Tobias
IDEs like Android Studio and XCode have a lot of features that simplify the development and UI creation process. Do you have to forego those niceties when developing a mobile app in Python? – Tobias
Shipping Python applications is a problem that tends to pose a host of issues for people, which you are addressing with the Briefcase project. What are some of the biggest hurdles and design choices that you have encountered while working on that? – Tobias
Do you think that there will ever be a release of iOS or Android, or even a brand new mobile platform, that will ship with native Python support? – Tobias
Keep In Touch
Twitter
Website
GitHub
Picks
Tobias
Japanese cast iron tea set

Chris
Bantam Cider
Pythonista 3

Russell
MHPrompt
Open Sourcing Mental Illness
Blue Hackers
Beyond Blue
Black Dog institute
Mental Health.gov

Links
A Tale of Two Cellphones
Python interpreter in 500 lines of code
The intro and outro music is from Requiem for a Fish The Freak Fandango Orchestra / CC BY-SA
1 hr 11 min
June 26, 2016 Armin Ronacher
Armin Ronacher is a prolific contributor to the Python software ecosystem, creating such widely used projects as Flask and Jinja2. This week we got the opportunity to talk to him about how he got his start with Python and what has inspired him to create the various tools that have made our lives easier. We also discussed his experiences working in Rust and how it can interface with Python.
1 hr 1 min
June 26, 2016Armin Ronacher
Summary
Armin Ronacher is a prolific contributor to the Python software ecosystem, creating such widely used projects as Flask and Jinja2. This week we got the opportunity to talk to him about how he got his start with Python and what has inspired him to create the various tools that have made our lives easier. We also discussed his experiences working in Rust and how it can interface with Python.
Brief Introduction
Hello and welcome to Podcast.__init__, the podcast about Python and the people who make it great.
I would like to thank everyone who has donated to the show. Your contributions help us make the show sustainable. For details on how to support the show you can visit our site at pythonpodcast.com
Linode is sponsoring us this week. Check them out at linode.com/podcastinit and get a $20 credit to try out their fast and reliable Linux virtual servers for your next project
We are also sponsored by Sentry this week. Stop hoping your users will report bugs. Sentry’s real-time tracking gives you insight into production deployments and information to reproduce and fix crashes. Check them out at getsentry.com
Visit our site to subscribe to our show, sign up for our newsletter, read the show notes, and get in touch.
To help other people find the show you can leave a review on iTunes, or Google Play Music, and tell your friends and co-workers
Join our community! Visit discourse.pythonpodcast.com for your opportunity to find out about upcoming guests, suggest questions, and propose show ideas.
Your hosts as usual are Tobias Macey and Chris Patti
Today we’re interviewing Armin Ronacher about his contributions to the Python community.
Interview with Armin Ronacher
Introductions
How did you get introduced to Python? – Chris
What was the first open source project that you created in Python? – Tobias
What is your view of the responsibility for open source project maintainers and how do you manage a smooth handoff for projects that you no longer wish to be involved in? – Tobias
You have created a large number of successful open source libraries and tools during your career. What are some of the projects that may be less well known that you think people might find interesting? – Tobias (e.g. logbook)
I notice that you recently worked on the pipsi project. Please tell us about it! – Chris
Following on from the last question, where would you like to see the Python packaging infrastructure go in the future? – Chris
You have had some strong opinions of Python 2 vs Python 3. How has your position on that subject changed over time? – Tobias
Let’s talk about Lektor – what differentiates it from the pack, and what keeps you coming back to CMS projects? – Chris
How has your blogging contributed to the work that you do and the success you have achieved? – Tobias
Lately you have been doing a fair amount of work with Rust. What was your reasoning for learning that language and how has it influenced your work with Python? – Tobias
In addition to the code you have written, you also helped to form the Pocoo organization. Can you explain what Pocoo is and what it does? What has inspired the rebranding to the Pallets project? – Tobias
Keep In Touch
Twitter
Picks
Tobias
Radical Candor

Chris
Loverbeer BeerBrugna
The Human Resource Machine

Armin
Biermanufaktur Loncium
Matakustix – Hai Hai Haibodn

Links
PHPbb
Pocoo
Pallets Project
The intro and outro music is from Requiem for a Fish The Freak Fandango Orchestra / CC BY-SA
1 hr 1 min
June 18, 2016 Bandit with Tim Kelsey, Travis McPeak, and Eric Brown
Making sure that your code is secure is a difficult task. In this episode we spoke to Eric Brown, Travis McPeak, and Tim Kelsey about their work on the Bandit library, which is a static analysis engine to help you find potential vulnerabilities before your application reaches production. We discussed how it works, how to make it fit your use case, and why it was created. Give the show a listen and then go start scanning your projects!
29 min
June 18, 2016Bandit with Tim Kelsey, Travis McPeak, and Eric Brown
Summary
Making sure that your code is secure is a difficult task. In this episode we spoke to Eric Brown, Travis McPeak, and Tim Kelsey about their work on the Bandit library, which is a static analysis engine to help you find potential vulnerabilities before your application reaches production. We discussed how it works, how to make it fit your use case, and why it was created. Give the show a listen and then go start scanning your projects!
Brief Introduction
Hello and welcome to Podcast.__init__, the podcast about Python and the people who make it great.
I would like to thank everyone who has donated to the show. Your contributions help us make the show sustainable. For details on how to support the show you can visit our site at pythonpodcast.com
Linode is sponsoring us this week. Check them out at linode.com/podcastinit and get a $20 credit to try out their fast and reliable Linux virtual servers for your next project. And they just doubled the RAM for their introductory level servers, so that $20 will get you even more performance.
We are also sponsored by Sentry this week. Stop hoping your users will report bugs. Sentry’s real-time tracking gives you insight into production deployments and information to reproduce and fix crashes. Check them out at getsentry.com and use the code podcastinit at signup to get a $50 credit!
Visit our site to subscribe to our show, sign up for our newsletter, read the show notes, and get in touch.
To help other people find the show you can leave a review on iTunes, or Google Play Music, and tell your friends and co-workers
Join our community! Visit discourse.pythonpodcast.com for your opportunity to find out about upcoming guests, suggest questions, and propose show ideas.
Your hosts as usual are Tobias Macey and Chris Patti
Today we’re interviewing Tim Kelsey and Eric Brown about Bandit which is a static analysis engine for finding security vulnerabilities in your Python code.
Interview with Eric Brown, Travis McPeak and Tim Kelsey
Introductions
How did you get introduced to Python? – Chris
What is Bandit and what was the inspiration for creating it? – Tobias
How did you each get involved with the Bandit project? – Tobias
At what stage of the development process would you want to use Bandit? – Tobias
What kinds of analysis does Bandit do on the source code that it is run against? – Tobias
How does it determine whether a particular segment of code is introducing a vulnerability and what means does it use to determine the severity? – Tobias
What does the generated report include and what can be done with that information? – Tobias
What are some of the biggest design and implementation difficulties that have been encountered in the process of creating Bandit? – Tobias
How does bandit compare to similar tools in other languages such as Ruby’s BrakeMan? – Tobias
What are some of the most interesting extensions that you have seen for Bandit? – Tobias
What is on the roadmap for the future of Bandit? – Tobias
Keep In Touch
OpenStack Security IRC
OpenStack Security Weekly Meeting
Tim
Twitter

Travis
Twitter

Picks
Tobias
Toggl
Listener Review of Toggl

Any.do

Tim
IFTTT (If This Then That)

Eric
Slack

Travis
Brilliance Trilogy
Uncharted 4
Risky Business Podcast

The intro and outro music is from Requiem for a Fish The Freak Fandango Orchestra / CC BY-SA
29 min
June 12, 2016 Sentry with David Cramer
As developers we all have to deal with bugs sometimes, but we don’t have to make our users deal with them too. Sentry is a project that automatically detects errors in your applications and surfaces the necessary information to help you fix them quickly. In this episode we interviewed David Cramer about the history of Sentry and how he has built a team around it to provide a hosted offering of the open source project. We covered how the Sentry project got started, how it scales, and how to run a company based on open source.
1 hr 10 min
June 12, 2016Sentry with David Cramer
Visit our site to listen to past episodes, support the show, join our community, and sign up for our mailing list.
Summary
As developers we all have to deal with bugs sometimes, but we don’t have to make our users deal with them too. Sentry is a project that automatically detects errors in your applications and surfaces the necessary information to help you fix them quickly. In this episode we interviewed David Cramer about the history of Sentry and how he has built a team around it to provide a hosted offering of the open source project. We covered how the Sentry project got started, how it scales, and how to run a company based on open source.
Brief Introduction
Hello and welcome to Podcast.__init__, the podcast about Python and the people who make it great.
I would like to thank everyone who has donated to the show. Your contributions help us make the show sustainable. For details on how to support the show, subscribe, join our newsletter, check out the show notes, and get in touch you can visit our site at pythonpodcast.com
Linode is sponsoring us this week. Check them out at linode.com/podcastinit and get a $20 credit to try out their fast and reliable Linux virtual servers for your next project
We are also sponsored by Sentry this week. Stop hoping your users will report bugs. Sentry’s real-time tracking gives you insight into production deployments and information to reproduce and fix crashes. Check them out at getsentry.com and use the code podcastinit at signup to get a $50 credit!- Join our community! Visit discourse.pythonpodcast.com for your opportunity to find out about upcoming guests, suggest questions, and propose show ideas.
Your hosts as usual are Tobias Macey and Chris Patti
Today we’re interviewing David Cramer about Sentry which is an open source and hosted service for capturing and tracking exceptions in your applications.
Interview with Firstname Lastname
Introductions
How did you get introduced to Python? – Chris
What is Sentry and how did it get started? – Tobias
What led you to choose Python for writing Sentry and would you make the same choice again? – Tobias
Error reporting needs to be super light weight in order to be useful. What were some implementation challenges you faced around this issue? – Chris
Why would a developer want to use a project like Sentry and what makes it stand out from other offerings? – Tobias
When would someone want to use a different error tracking service? – Tobias
Can you describe the architecture of the Sentry project both in terms of the software design and the infrastructure necessary to run it? – Tobias
What made you choose Django versus another Python web framework, and would you choose it today? – Chris
What languages and platforms does Sentry support and how does a developer integrate it into their application? – Tobias
One of the big discussions in open source these days is around maintainability and a common approach is to have a hosted offering to pay the bills for keeping the project moving forward. How has your experience been with managing the open source community around the project in conjunction with providing a stable and reliable hosted service for it? – Tobias
Are there any benefits to using the hosted offering beyond the fact of not having to manage the service on your own? – Tobias
Have you faced any performance challenges implementing Sentry’s server side? – Chris
What advice can you give to people who are trying to get the most utility out of their usage of Sentry? – Tobias
What kinds of challenges have you encountered in the process of adding support for such a wide variety of languages and runtimes? – Tobias
Capturing the context of an error can be immensely useful in finding and solving it effectively. Can you describe the facilities in Sentry and Raven that assist developers in providing that information? – Tobias
It’s challenging to create an effective method for aggregating incoming issues so that they are sufficiently visible and useful while not hiding or discarding important information. Can you explain how you do that and what the evolution of that system has been like? – Tobias
I notice a lot of from future import in Sentry. Does it support Python 3 and/or what’s the plan for getting there? – Chris
Looking back to the beginning of the project, what are some of the most interesting and surprising changes that have happened during its lifetime? How does it differ from its original vision? – Tobias
Keep In Touch
Twitter
Picks
Tobias
BPython

Chris
Developer on Fire
Song Exploder

David
React
Webpack
Alpine Climbing
Percy.io
Red Rising Trilogy

The intro and outro music is from Requiem for a Fish The Freak Fandango Orchestra / CC BY-SA
1 hr 10 min
June 05, 2016 Mercurial with Augie Fackler
As developers, one of the most important tools that we use daily is our version control system. Mercurial is one such tool that is written in Python, making it eminently flexible, customizable, and incredibly powerful. This week we spoke with Augie Fackler to learn about the history, features, and future of Mercurial.
56 min
June 05, 2016Mercurial with Augie Fackler
Visit our site to listen to past episodes, support the show, join our community, and sign up for our mailing list.
Summary
As developers, one of the most important tools that we use daily is our version control system. Mercurial is one such tool that is written in Python, making it eminently flexible, customizable, and incredibly powerful. This week we spoke with Augie Fackler to learn about the history, features, and future of Mercurial.
Brief Introduction
Hello and welcome to Podcast.__init__, the podcast about Python and the people who make it great.
I would like to thank everyone who has donated to the show. Your contributions help us make the show sustainable. For details on how to support the show you can visit our site at pythonpodcast.com
Linode is sponsoring us this week. Check them out at linode.com/podcastinit and get a $20 credit to try out their fast and reliable Linux virtual servers for your next project
We are also sponsored by Sentry this week. Stop hoping your users will report bugs. Sentry’s real-time tracking gives you insight into production deployments and information to reproduce and fix crashes. Check them out at getsentry.com and use the code podcastinit at signup to get a $50 credit!
Visit our site to subscribe to our show, sign up for our newsletter, read the show notes, and get in touch.
To help other people find the show you can leave a review on iTunes, or Google Play Music, and tell your friends and co-workers
Join our community! Visit discourse.pythonpodcast.com for your opportunity to find out about upcoming guests, suggest questions, and propose show ideas.
Your hosts as usual are Tobias Macey and Chris Patti
Today we’re interviewing Augie Fackler about the Mercurial version control system
Interview with Augie Fackler
Introductions
How did you get introduced to Python? – Chris
Can you describe what Mercurial is and how the project got started? – Tobias
How did you get involved with working on Mercurial? – Tobias
What are some of the features that can be found in Mercurial which are lacking in similar tools such as Git or Bazaar? – Tobias
One of the common complaints with Git is that its human interface could use some work. How is Mercurial’s UX an improvement over Git? – Chris
For someone who is using Mercurial to work with a Git or other VCS repository, what are some of the edge cases that they should watch out for? Are there certain operations that could be performed in Mercurial which would break that compatibility layer? – Tobias
How is Mercurial architected and what are some of the design choices that allow for it to be so flexible and extensible? – Tobias
One of the core goals of Mercurial is for it to be safe. Can you explain what safety means in this context and how it is architected to achieve that goal? – Tobias
One of the noteworthy aspects of Mercurial is the strong focus on making extensions a first-class concern in the project, so much so that a number of the core functions are written as extensions. Can you describe why that is and how the extensions plug into the core execution engine? – Tobias
What are some of the most notable extensions that are available for use with Mercurial? – Tobias
For someone who is familiar with Git, what are some of the concepts that they would need to learn about in order to use Mercurial in an idiomatic way? – Tobias
A large part of the reason that Git has seen such large adoption is due to the prevalence of GitHub. There is the option of using BitBucket when using Mercurial. Are there any other noteworthy Mercurial hosting options? Do you think that the dearth of open source mercurial servers is partially due to the fact that Mercurial ships with a functional server built in? – Tobias
Can you share some of the most recent features that have been added to Mercurial? – Tobias
What do you have planned for the future of Mercurial? – Tobias
How do you think current day DVCS systems like Mercurial, Git and Darcs might evolve in the future? – Chris
Keep In Touch
Twitter
Picks
Tobias
Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harrari
Cultures of Continuous Learning Keynote by Vanessa Hurst

Chris
Intro to Django Video Series
Transistor Podcast
Embedded Podcast

Augie
Leviathan Wakes
Three Body Problem
Prometheus

Links
Mercurial: The Definitive Guide
Online
Print

Revsets

Git Pickaxe

Facebook Mercurial Post

Remote File Log

Gerrit

Kallithea

Reviewboard

Mozilla Review Board

A Case of Computational Thinking: The Subtle Effect ofHidden Dependencies on the User Experience of VersionControl

The intro and outro music is from Requiem for a Fish The Freak Fandango Orchestra / CC BY-SA
56 min
May 28, 2016 Pillow with Alex Clark
If you need to work with images the Pillow is the library to use. The Python Image Libary (PIL) has long been the gold standard for resizing, analyzing, and processing pictures in Python. Pillow is the modern fork that is bringing the PIL into the future so that we can all continue to use it moving forward. This week I spoke with Alex Clark about what first led him to fork the project and his experience maintaining it, including the migration to Python 3.
21 min