#The Big Book of Small Python Projects
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The Big Book of Small Python Projects
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#The Big Book of Small Python Projects#ebooks#education#free education#educate yourselves#educate yourself#learn python#python#developers#python language#python books
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#book for python#best books for learning python#the big book of small python projects#python projects books#python books with projects
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Choso headcanons :)
okokok here's some random stuff i came up with.
choso would try very hard to learn how to do your hair for you. he usually has his hair up in buns, right? so he'll happily do that for you. but also will take the time to learn how to braid, or use tools like a curler/straightener to style it the way you like. even on days you don't necessarily style it, he also loves to just brush it for you. i think he'd find the action sweet and intimate.
always lets you try to food he makes (when eating in) or orders (when eating out) and would never get annoyed if you eat more of his food than your own. in fact i think he'd find it adorable <3
100,000,000% will get a matching tattoo with you. big or small, meaningful or silly/cute. if you suggest it he's booking an appt with his regular artist right away.
also he has a favorite tattoo artist that has done most of his sleeves and some others on his back and legs. choso loves tattoos. what he likes most about his are that you like to mindlessly trace them from time to time when you're lounging around together.
doting partner. never slacks off on the chores. never makes you feel like you're doing most of the work. often surprises you with a perfectly clean house and dinner cooking on the stove when he's home before you and has time to spare.
and speaking of doting. he's there for anything you need company for. a nail appt? he's chatting with your technician and playing pokemon go. grocery shopping? without fail, what a great excuse for walking around and holding your hand. gotta run to the pharmacy? he's happy to drive you and wait with you. no matter what you're doing, he's grateful to spend time with you.
he's more perceptive than most people give him credit for. but he can read your expression in a second. even if you're quick to go blank, he'll catch that frown or wince or shock before you've even realized you'd made that face out loud. if it's stress, he's holding your hand or wrapping an arm around your waist. if you're reacting to something that just happened but are trying to be subtle about it, he'll smirk and follow your line of sight to see what had caught your attention. wordlessly, the two of you will practically gossip between yourselves.
ok last one on my mind. choso is a reptile person. he would definitely have a beardie or maybe a leopard gecko or a ball python or something. and he'd love that little thing. coos and baby talks it when it eats well or is just sittin in it's enclosure basking. if you're not a reptile person he'd be understanding and keep the enclosure somewhere that you won't see often and get creeped out. but if you are a reptile person he would be ecstatic to see you spend some enrichment time with the little creature. (i'm totally not projecting myself here hehehe)
#jordie says stuff#choso x reader#choso kamo x reader#choso headcanons#kamo choso x reader#choso brainrot#kamo choso headcanons#choso kamo headcanons#jjk#jujutsu kaisen#jjk x reader#jujutsu kaisen x reader#jjk headcanons#jujutsu kaisen headcanons#jjk x reader headcanons#jujutsu kaisen x reader headcanons
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Java Full Stack vs. Python Full Stack: My Journey Choosing One
Back when I was figuring out my path as a coder, I spent countless evenings at a tiny tea stall near my apartment in Pune, scribbling notes about whether to go all-in on Java or Python for full stack development. It felt like choosing between two best friends—one steady and reliable, the other quick and fun. Both could help me build websites from the flashy front end to the gritty back end, but they had such different flavors. If you’re standing at the same crossroads, wondering whether Java full stack or Python full stack is your vibe, let me walk you through what I learned, like we’re chatting over a cup of chai. This is about what each path feels like, how they work, and what they mean for your coding life.
Java and Python both let you do this, but they’re like cooking with different spices. Java’s the old-school chef, meticulous and trusted by big restaurants. Python’s the trendy food truck cook, whipping up dishes fast and winning fans with ease. I remember my first gig at a small tech firm, where I had to pick one to build a client’s app. That choice shaped how I saw these two worlds.
Java full stack felt like stepping into a well-oiled machine. Java’s been around forever, powering huge systems like bank apps or online stores. For the front end, you’d use something like React or Angular, which are JavaScript-based, but Java takes over on the back end with Spring Boot. I worked on a project for a logistics company, using Spring Boot to connect a user-friendly dashboard to a database tracking shipments. Setting it up was like assembling a complicated LEGO set—lots of pieces to snap together, like configuration files and dependency setups. Java’s strict rules, like spelling out every variable’s type, made me slow down and think, but that rigor meant our app could handle thousands of users without crashing. It’s a favorite in places like finance or government, where things can’t afford to break.
Python full stack, though, was like cooking with a recipe that just clicks. Python’s so easy to read, it’s like writing a letter. On the back end, you’d use Django or Flask, which are like cheat codes for building apps fast. I helped a friend’s startup build a booking app with Django, and we had a working prototype in days. Django gave us pre-built tools for user logins and database connections, so we could focus on making the app look good. Like Java, you’d pair it with JavaScript for the front end. Python’s perfect for startups or projects tied to data crunching, like apps that use AI to recommend products. The downside? It’s not as speedy for massive systems, so if you’re building the next Amazon, it might struggle.
The tools you use show how different these paths are. With Java, I was glued to IntelliJ, an IDE that felt like a spaceship control panel, and Spring Boot for back-end logic. We used Maven to keep track of all the libraries we needed, which was handy but felt like paperwork. Python was simpler. I’d fire up VS Code, a lightweight editor, and use Django with pip to grab packages. Java’s setup took time, like prepping a gourmet meal. Python let me jump straight to coding, like tossing ingredients into a stir-fry.
Learning each one was its own adventure. Java was tough at first. I’d groan at writing long chunks of code just to do simple things, like connecting to a database. But that structure taught me discipline, which paid off when I joined a big team where everyone had to sync up. Python was a joy to learn. I’d write a few lines, and boom, something worked. It felt like magic, especially for small projects at places like Technoscripts, where you’re churning out prototypes. But Python’s looseness meant I had to be careful not to write messy code that’d haunt me later.
Jobs-wise, both are gold in 2025. Java full stack devs are snapped up by big firms—think Wipro or Accenture—building systems that need to last decades. In India, freshers might earn ₹5-10 lakh a year, more in the U.S. Python full stack devs shine in startups or tech-driven companies like Flipkart, especially for AI or data-heavy apps. Salaries are close, maybe ₹4-9 lakh for beginners. Java’s strength is its grip on corporate giants; Python’s is its speed and AI edge.
So, which did I pick? I started with Python because it got me coding fast and felt less intimidating. Later, I learned Java to tackle bigger projects. If you want to build bulletproof systems and don’t mind a challenge, go Java. If you love moving quick and dreaming up cool apps, Python’s your friend. Either way, you’re building the web’s future, and that’s pretty darn exciting.
Want to master Java and Python ?
So enroll now in our Full Stack Java Course in Pune or Full Stack Python Developer Course in Pune
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Hero AI Bonus
10 Hacks to Become an AI Genius!
Calling all AI enthusiasts, tech titans, and future heroes! Do you dream of commanding powerful AI tools like a pro? Do you want to build robots that rule the school science fair (or maybe even the world)? Well, buckle up, because this guide is your launchpad to hero status!
Unleash the Data Dragon: AI thrives on information. Feed your AI projects with diverse data – text, images, audio, you name it! The more it munches, the smarter it gets. Imagine training your AI to recognize your dog's grumpy face or translate your epic jokes into alien languages – possibilities are endless!
Code Crusader Training: Don't be intimidated by code! Even basic coding skills unlock superpowers. Learn languages like Python or JavaScript – they're like magic spells for controlling your AI creations. Think of building a chatbot that roasts your friends (harmlessly, of course) or an AI artist that paints masterpieces based on your emotions!
Think Like a Machine Maestro: It's time to ditch the "human way" and embrace the AI mindset. Learn about algorithms, machine learning, and neural networks – they're the brains behind the brawn. Imagine explaining complex concepts to your AI in a way it understands, unlocking its true potential!
Experimentation is Your Superpower: Don't be afraid to mess around! Try different AI tools, play with code, and see what wacky (and wonderful) things you can create. Remember, even the coolest heroes make mistakes – it's how they learn and grow (plus, it's super fun!).
Join the Hero AI Squad: The internet is bursting with Hero AI Bonus communities! Forums, online courses, and even local coding clubs are your training grounds. Share your creations, ask questions, and learn from other aspiring heroes. Teamwork makes the AI dream work!
Read Like a Reading Rainbow (But for AI): Devour books, articles, and tutorials about AI. The more you know, the more you can do. Imagine explaining the latest AI advancements to your classmates, impressing everyone with your hero-level knowledge!
Practice Makes Perfect (Even for AI Heroes): The more you work with AI, the better you'll understand it. Start small – build a simple app, and train a basic AI model. As you level up, tackle more complex challenges. Remember, even the mightiest heroes started somewhere!
Think Big, Dream Bigger: Don't limit yourself to small projects. Dream of using AI to solve real-world problems! Imagine tackling climate change, creating accessible technologies, or even exploring the cosmos – the possibilities are truly heroic!
Share Your Heroism: Inspire others! Show off your AI creations, teach others what you've learned, and get them excited about the future. Remember, with great AI power comes great responsibility (to share your awesomeness with the world)!
Never Stop Learning: The world of Hero AI Bonus is constantly evolving. Stay curious, keep learning, and embrace the unknown. Remember, the journey to becoming a Hero AI Mastermind is an epic adventure, not a destination. So, have fun, experiment, and never stop striving for AI greatness!
With these tips, you're well on your way to becoming a true Hero AI Mastermind! Remember, the path is filled with challenges, but with dedication, curiosity, and a dash of hero spirit, you can achieve anything. Now go forth, young hero, and conquer the world of AI!
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The Right Path To Become A Data Scientist : A Beginner Guide
Embarking on the journey to become a data scientist may seem like entering a mysterious world, but fear not! Here’s a guide to illuminate your path, featuring the renowned ACTE Technologies Best Data Science Course. Let’s break down the steps to become a data scientist in simpler terms:
Step 1: Lay the Foundation Start by understanding the basics.
Data Awareness: Learn about different types of data like numbers, text, and images. Know the difference between structured and unstructured data.
Tool Mastery: Get familiar with programming languages like Python or R, as they’ll be your coding companions in the data science world.
Step 2: Develop Your Magical Toolkit Dive into foundational elements that make you a data wizard.
Math Mastery: You don’t need to be a math genius, but having a good understanding of statistics, linear algebra, and calculus will enhance your analytical skills.
Step 3: Master the Art of Machine Learning Machine learning is your trusty sidekick in making sense of data.
Understanding Machine Learning: Think of it as a wise mentor guiding your analytical endeavors.
Key Concepts: Get to know supervised and unsupervised learning, regression, classification — these are the tools for predictive analytics.
Step 4: Taming Big Data Enter the world of big data, where vast amounts of information await your expertise.
Big Data Principles: Understand the three Vs — Volume, Velocity, and Variety.
Tools: Get familiar with Hadoop and Spark, your allies in navigating big data challenges.
Step 5: Real-World Applications Test your skills in practical projects.
Individual Projects: Start small projects aligned with your interests, applying your skills in real-world scenarios.
Kaggle Competitions: Join these competitive arenas to strengthen and validate your skills.
Step 6: Never Stop Learning In the ever-evolving landscape of data science, continuous learning is key.
Literature Exploration: Dive into blogs and books to gain insights from seasoned practitioners.
Enroll in Courses: ACTE Technologies offers a comprehensive Data Science course in Bangalore, covering programming, statistical analysis, and machine learning. The course provides certifications and job placement opportunities, a valuable step in your journey.
Step 7: Join the Data Science Community Networking and collaboration are crucial for growth.
Networking: Engage with fellow learners on platforms like GitHub and Stack Overflow.
Your journey to becoming a data scientist involves learning, exploration, and practical application. With a solid foundation, continuous curiosity, and a reliable companion like the ACTE Technologies course, you’re on your way to mastering the art of data science. May your path be filled with discovery and success!
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hey, i started following you recently and ur bio says ur a hacker? any tips on where to start? hacking seems like a v cool/fun way to learn more abt coding and cybersecurity/infrastructure and i'd like to explore it but there's so much on the internet and like, i'm not trying to get into anything illegal. thanks!
huh, an interesting question, ty!
i can give more tailored advice if you hit me up on chat with more specifics on your background/interests.
given what you've written here, though, i'll just assume you don't have any immediate professional aspirations (e.g. you just want to learn some things, and you aren't necessarily trying to get A Cyber Security Job TM within the next three months or w/e), and that you don't know much about any specific programming/computering domain yet.
(stuff under cut because long)
first i'd probably just try to pick some interesting problem that you think you can solve with tech. this doesn't need to be a "hacking" project at first; i was just messing around with computers for ages before i did anything involving security/exploitation.
if you don't already know how to program, you should ideally pick a problem you can solve via programming. for instance: i learned a lot back in the 2000s, when play-by-post forum RPGs were in vogue. see, i'd already been messing around, building my own personal sites, first just with HTML & CSS, and later on with Javascript and PHP. and i knew the forum software everyone used (InvisionPowerBoard) was written in PHP. so when one of the admins at my RPG complained that they'd like the ability to set multiple profile pictures, i was like, "hey i'm good at programming, want me to create a mod to do that," and then i just... did. so then they asked me to program more features, and i got all the sexy nerd cred for being Forum Mod Queen, and it was a good time, i learned a lot.
(i also got to be the person who was frantically IMed at 2am because wtf the forum is down and there's an inscrutable error, what do??? basically sysadmining! also, much less sexy! still, i learned a lot!)
the key thing is that it's gotta be a problem that's interesting to you: as much as i love making dorky sites in PHP, half the fun was seeing other people using my stuff, and i think the era of forum-based RPGs has passed. but maybe you can apply some programming talents to something that you are interested in—maybe you want to make a silly Chrome extension to make people laugh, a la Cloud to Butt, or maybe you'd like to make a program that converts pixel art into cross-stitching patterns, maybe you want to just make a cool adventure game on those annoying graphing calculators they make you use in class, or make a script for some online game you play, or make something silly with Arduino (i once made a trash can that rolled toward me when i clapped my hands; it was fun, and way easier than you'd think!), whatever.
i know a lot of hacker-types who got their start doing ROM hacking for video games—replacing the character art or animations or whatever in old NES games. that's probably more relevant than the PHP websites, at least, and is probably a solid place to get started; in my experience those communities tend to be reasonably friendly to questions. pick a small thing you want to do & ask how to do it.
also, a somewhat unconventional path, but—once i knew how to program a bit of Python, i started doing goofy junk, like, "hey can i implemented NamedTuple from scratch,” which tends to lead to Python metaprogramming, which leads to surprising shit like "oh, stack frames are literally just Python objects and you can manually edit them in the interpreter to do deliberately horrendous/silly things, my god this language allows too much reflection and i'm having too much fun"... since Python is a lot of folks' first language these days, i thought i'd point that out, since i think this is a pretty accessible start to thinking about How Programs Actually Work under the hood. allison kaptur has some specific recommendations on how to poke around, if you wanna go that route.
it's reasonably likely you'll end up doing something "hackery" in the natural course of just working on stuff. for instance, while i was working on the IPB forum software mods, i became distressed to learn that everyone was using an INSECURE version of the software! no one was patching their shit!! i yelled at the admins about it, and they were like "well we haven't been hacked yet so it's not a problem," so i uh, decided to demonstrate a proof of concept? i downloaded some sketchy perl script, kicked it until it worked, logged in as the admins, and shitposted a bit before i logged out, y'know, to prove my point.
(they responded by banning me for two weeks, and did not patch their software. which, y'know, rip to them; they got hacked by an unrelated Turkish group two months later, and those dudes just straight-up deleted the whole website. i was a merciful god by comparison!)
anyway, even though downloading a perl script and just pointing it at a website isn't really "hacking" (it's the literal definition of script kiddie, heh)—the point is i was just experimenting a lot and trying a lot of stuff, which meant i was getting comfortable with thinking of software as not just some immutable relic, but something you can touch and prod in unexpected ways.
this dovetails into the next thing, which is like, just learn a lot of stuff. a boring conventional computer science degree will teach you a lot (provided you take it seriously and actually try to learn shit); alternatively, just taking the same classes as a boring conventional computer science degree, via edX or whatever free online thingy, will also teach you a lot. ("contributing to open source" also teaches you a lot but... hngh... is a whole can of worms; send a follow-up ask if you want that rant.)
here's where i should note that "hacking" is an impossibly broad category: the kind of person who knows how to fuck with website authentication tokens is very different than someone who writes a fuzzer, who is often quite different than someone who looks at the bug a fuzzer produces and actually writes a program that can exploit that bug... so what you focus on depends on what you're interested in. i imagine classes with names like "compilers," "operating systems," and "networking" will teach you a lot. but, like, idk, all knowledge is god-breathed and good for teaching. hell, i hear some universities these days have actual computer security classes? that's probably a good thing to look at, just to get a sense of what's out there, if you already know how to program.
also be comfortable with not knowing everything, but also, learn as you go. the bulk of my security knowledge came when i got kinda airdropped into a work team that basically hired me entirely on "potential" (lmao), and uh, prior to joining i only had the faintest idea what a hypervisor was? or the whole protection ring concept? or ioctls or sandboxing or threat models or, fuck, anything? i mostly just pestered people with like 800 questions and slowly built up a knowledge base, and remember being surprised & delighted when i went to a security conference a year later and could follow most of the talks, and when i wound up at a bar with a guy on the xbox security team and we compared our security models a bunch, and so on. there wasn't a magic moment when i "got it", i was just like, "okay huh this dude says he found a ring-0 exploit... what does that mean... okay i think i got that... why is that a big deal though... better ask somebody.." (also: reading an occasional dead tree book is a good idea. i owe my firstborn to Robert Love's Linux Kernel Development, as outdated as it is, and also O'Reilly's kookaburra book gave me a great overview of web programming back in the day, etc. you can learn a lot by just clicking around random blogs, but you’ll often end up with a lot of random little facts and no good mental scaffolding for holding it together; often, a decent book will give you that scaffolding.)
(also, it's pretty useful if you can find a knowledgable someone to pepper with random questions as you go. finding someone who will actively mentor you is tricky, but most working computery folks are happy to tell you things like "what you're doing is actually impossible, here's why," or "here's a tutorial someone told me was good for learning how to write a linux kernel module," or "here's my vague understanding of this concept you know nothing about," or "here's how you automate something to click on a link on a webpage," which tends to be handier than just google on its own.)
if you're reading this and you're like "ok cool but where's the part where i'm handed a computer and i gotta break in while going all hacker typer”—that's not the bulk of the work, alas! like, for sure, we do have fun pranking each other by trying dumb ways of stealing each other's passwords or whatever (once i stuck a keylogger in a dude's keyboard, fun times). but a lot of my security jobs have involved stuff like, "stare at this disassembly a long fuckin' time to figure out how the program pointer got all fucked up," or, "write a fuzzer that feeds a lot of randomized input to some C++ program, watch the program crash because C++ is a horrible language for writing software, go fix all the bugs," or "think Really Hard TM about all the settings and doohickeys this OS/GPU/whatever has, think about all the awful things someone could do with it, threat model and sandbox accordingly." occasionally i have done cool proof-of-concept hacks but honestly writing exploits can kinda be tedious, lol, so like, i'm only doing that if it's the only way i can get people to believe that Yes This Is Actually A Problem, Fix Your Code
"lua that's cool and all but i wanted, like, actual links and recommendations and stuff" okay, fair. here's some ideas:
microcorruption: very fun embedded security CTF; teaches you everything you need to know as you're doing it.
cryptopals crypto challenges: very fun little programming exercises that teach you a lot of fundamental cryptography concepts as you're going along! you can do these even as a bit of a n00b; i did them in Python for the lulz
the binary bomb lab is hilariously copied by, like, so many CS programs, lol, but for good reason. it's accessible and fun and is the first time most people get to feel like a real hacker! (requires you know a bit of C beforehand)
ctftime is a good way to see when new CTFs ("capture the flag"s; security-focused competitions) are coming up. or, sometimes CTFs post their source code, so you can continue trying them after the CTF is over. i liked Stripe's CTFs when they were going, because they focused on "web stuff", and "web stuff" was all i really knew at the time. if you're more interested in staring at disassembly, there's CTFs focused on that sort of thing too.
azeria has good ARM assembly & exploitation tutorials
also, like, lots of good talks out there; just watching defcon/cansecwest/etc talks until something piques your interest is very fun. i'd die on a battlefield for any of Christopher Domas's talks, but he assumes a lot of specific x86/OS knowledge, lol, so maybe don’t start with that. oh, Julia Evans's blog is honestly probably pretty good for just learning a lot of stuff and really beginner-friendly?
oh and wrt legality... idk, i haven't addressed it here since it hasn't come up in my own work much, tbh. if you're just getting started you're kind of unlikely to Break The Law without, y'know, realizing maybe you're doing something a bit gray-area? and you can cross that bridge when you come to it? Real Hacking TM is way more of a pain-in-the-ass than doing CTFs and such, and you'll learn way more with the latter, so who cares lol just do the fun thing
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Not sure what kind of suggestions you were looking for the modern AU, but I personally find learning about the backgrounds of characters interesting (in any setting!), so maybe you might want to write about what kind of families the trio have, or their hometowns...? :)
Oohh, thank you so much! (And I was looking for anything ranging from suggestions on where to start to 'I know more about these blorbos than you, here is how they'd be in modern times' 😂)
That's real solid advice, thanks! I jotted down a few ideas below, but they'll probably change around a bit as I figure things out... I tried to keep it as close to the canon dynamics as I could, since the plots are genuinely supposed to mirror each other.
Lukas:
Grew up in a well-off, small, country town. While the isolated countryside contributed to making him so peaceful, it also made him a bit sheltered and disconnected from peers
Lived with his politician father, mother, and older half-brother. His brother was the family’s perfect golden child: became a politician too, married well, etc
Lukas went off to a prestigious college, resigned to the same life as his family. At some point during/right after his studies, there was an announcement of an ambitious education project nearby. The leaders of the project (Clive, Mathilda, Clair) were looking for teachers and staff to bring the new program to areas in need
Lukas’s brother thought it would be an incredible PR move if someone in the family was a part of it, working with the children. None of them actually wanted to do it, so they sent Lukas off instead
Python:
Lived in a poorer city area, got a basic education but he took it really seriously
*John Mulaney voice* street smarts! (But really, he became very skilled at the ins and outs of the area and is very good with people)
Grew up with his alcoholic father, but basically spent all his time away from home with Forsyth. Went through a brief phase of seeking out his mother, but eventually became apathetic and focused more on himself and his future
Is known by a ton of locals and small businesses because he’s always hanging around being friendly with people. Although he isn’t always the sentimental type, many people have sort of taken him in as family
Forsyth:
Grew up right next to Python, but was homeschooled by his parents.
“Homeschooled” is used loosely, as they kind of just set Forsyth up with books and whatever tutorial videos he could find online and let him be. Both of them were out of the house working various jobs to make ends meet.
The city saw a lot of activist activity, so from a young age he was immersed in social and political issues. He developed big dreams from there of making a difference
Originally I said that he and Python met in daycare/preschool, but now I’m thinking that when they were in their young or tween years, Forsyth noticed a lot of kids picking on Python. One day, he stormed out and defended him (in full, chivalrous-knight style of course), and never left his side afterwards. He doesn’t see himself as a savior, or Python as in need of protecting, but is still always quick to keep him out of trouble.
Eventually Python and Forsyth are ready to move out together and settle somewhere a bit nicer. Forsyth hears about that education project, and chooses one of the locations as he and Python’s destination. I haven’t quite decided what this town/city is going to look like, but that’s where all the characters will converge and become friends :))
#thank you so much for the ask :D#i honestly didnt plan on brainstorming this much but this really inspired me to haha!#fe echoes#fe lukas#fe python#fe forsyth#not art
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WHAT I HAVE BEEN READING LATELY
Kage Baker’s Company Series
In the Garden of Iden
Sky Coyote
Mendoza in Hollywood
The Graveyard Game
The Life of the World to Come
The Children of the Company
The Machine's Child
The Sons of Heaven
The Empress of Mars
Not Less than Gods
Nell Gwynne's On Land and At Sea
Black Projects, White Knights: The Company Dossiers
Gods and Pawns
In the Company of Thieves
Ø Science Fiction written by a woman with Asperger’s. Wildly uneven. Main protagonist is female, but there are lots of POV characters, male and female.
Ø Big ideas.
Ø Lots of adventure, some action.
Ø Small doses of humor.
Neil Gaiman
Good Omens (with Sir Terry Pratchett)
Neverwhere
Stardust
American Gods
Anansi Boys
The Graveyard Book
The Ocean at the End of the Lane
Ø Neil’s books are a road trip with Carl Jung, Joseph Campbell and a baggie full of sativa.
Ø Ideas are incidental. The Milieu’s in charge.
Ø Adventure happens whether you like it or not.
Ø Cosmic humor. The joke’s on us.
Connie Willis’s Oxford Time Travel Series
Firewatch
Doomsday Book
To Say Nothing of the Dog (and the novel that inspired it – Jerome K. Jerome’s Three Men in a Boat)
Blackout/All Clear
Assorted:
The Last of the Winnebagos
Ø Connie loves her historical research. Blackout/All Clear actually lasts as long as the Blitz, but anything in the Oxford Time Travel series is worth reading. Doomsday Book reads like prophecy in retrospect.
Ø One idea: Hi! This is the human condition! How fucking amazing is that?!?
Ø Gut-punch adventure with extra consequences. Background action.
Ø I’d have to say that Doomsday Book is the funniest book about the black death I’ve ever read, which isn’t saying much. To Say Nothing of the Dog is classic farce, though. Girl’s got range.
Neal Stephenson
Snow Crash (After the apocalypse, the world will be ruled by Home-Owners Associations. Be afraid.)
Cryptonomicon
Anathem
Seveneves
Ø Neal writes big, undisciplined, unfocused books that keep unfolding in your mind for months after you’ve read them. He’s a very guy-type writer, in spite of a female protagonist or two. Seveneves, be warned, starts out brilliant and devolves into extreme meh.
Ø Big. Fucking. Ideas.
Ø Battles, crashes, fistfights, parachute jumps, nuclear powered motorcycles and extreme gardening action. Is there an MPAA acronym for that?
Ø Humor dry enough to be garnished with two green olives on a stick.
Christopher Moore
Pine Cove Series:
Practical Demonkeeping
The Lust Lizard of Melancholy Cove
The Stupidest Angel: A Heartwarming Tale of Christmas Terror (Okay, yeah, Christmas. But Christmas with zombies, so that’s all right.)
Fluke (Not strictly Pine Cove, but in the same universe. Ever wonder why whales sing? They’re ordering Pastrami sandwiches. I’m not kidding.)
Death Merchant Chronicles:
A Dirty Job
Secondhand Souls (Best literary dogs this side of Jack London)
Coyote Blue (Kind of an outlier. Overlapping characters)
Shakespeare Series:
Fool
The Serpent of Venice
Shakespeare for Squirrels
Assorted:
Island of the Sequined Love Nun (Cargo cults with Pine Cove crossovers. I have a theory that the characters in this book are direct descendants of certain characters in Stephenson’s Cryptonomicon.)
Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal (So I have a favorite first-century wonder rabbi. Who doesn’t?)
Sacre Bleu
Noir
Ø Not for the squeamish, the easily offended, or those who can’t lovingly embrace the fact that the human species is pretty much a bunch of idiots snatching at moments of grace.
Ø No big ideas whatever. Barely any half-baked notions.
Ø Enthusiastic geek adventure. Action as a last resort.
Ø Nonstop funny from beginning to end.
Ben Aaronovitch’s Rivers of London Series
Rivers of London
Moon Over Soho
Whispers Under Ground
Broken Homes
Foxglove Summer
The Hanging Tree
The Furthest Station
Lies Sleeping
The October Man
False Value
Tales From the Folly
Ø Lean, self-deprecating police procedurals disguised as fantasy novels. Excellent writing.
Ø These will not expand your mind. They might expand your Latin vocabulary.
Ø Crisply described action, judiciously used. Whodunnit adventure. It’s all about good storytelling.
Ø Generous servings of sly humor. Aaronovitch is a geek culture blueblood who drops so many inside jokes, there are websites devoted to indexing them.
John Scalzi
Old Man’s War Series:
Old Man’s War
Questions for a Soldier
The Ghost Brigades
The Sagan Diary
The Last Colony
Zoe’s Tale
After the Coup
The Human Division
The End of All Things
Ø Star Trek with realpolitik instead of optimism.
Ø The Big Idea is that there’s nothing new under the sun. Nor over it.
Ø Action-adventure final frontier saga with high stakes.
Ø It’s funny when the characters are being funny, and precisely to the same degree that the character is funny.
Assorted:
The Dispatcher
Murder by Other Means
Redshirts (Star Trek, sideways, with occasional optimism)
Ø Scalzi abandons (or skewers) his space-opera tendencies with these three little gems of speculative fiction. Scalzi’s gift is patience. He lets the scenario unfold like a striptease.
Ø What-if thought experiments that jolt the brain like espresso shots.
Ø Action/misadventure as necessary to accomplish the psychological special effects.
Ø Redshirts is satire, so the humor is built-in, but it’s buried in the mix.
David Wong/Jason Pargin
John Dies at the End
This Book is Full of Spiders: Seriously, Dude, Don’t Touch It
What the Hell Did I Just Read?
Ø Pargin clearly starts his novels with a handful of arresting scenes and images, then looses the characters on an unsuspecting world to wander wither they will.
Ø Ideas aren’t as big or obvious as Heinlein, but they are there to challenge all your assumptions in the same way that Heinlein’s were.
Ø Classic action/adventure for anyone raised on Scooby-Doo.
Ø Occasional gusts of humor in a climate that’s predominantly tongue-in-cheek.
Jodi Taylor’s Chronicles of St. Mary’s Series
Just One Damned Thing After Another
The Very First Damned Thing
A Symphony of Echoes
When a Child is Born*
A Second Chance
Roman Holiday*
A Trail Through Time
Christmas Present*
No Time Like the Past
What Could Possible Go Wrong?
Ships and Stings and Wedding Rings*
Lies, Damned Lies and History
The Great St Mary’s Day Out*
My Name is Markham*
And the Rest is History
A Perfect Storm*
Christmas Past*
An Argumentation of Historians
The Battersea Barricades*
The Steam Pump Jump*
And Now for Something Completely Different*
Hope for the Best
When Did You Last See Your Father?*
Why Is Nothing Ever Simple*
Plan For The Worst
The Ordeal of the Haunted Room
Ø The * denotes a short story or novella. Okay, try to imagine Indiana Jones as a smartassed redheaded woman with a time machine and a merry band of full contact historians. I love history, and I especially love history narrated by a woman who can kick T. Rex ass.
Ø The ideas are toys, not themes. Soapy in spots.
Ø Action! Adventure! More action! More adventure! Tea break. Action again!
Ø Big, squishy dollops of snort-worthy stuff.
Laurie R. King’s Mary Russell Series
The Beekeeper's Apprentice
A Monstrous Regiment of Women
A Letter of Mary
The Moor
Jerusalem
Justice Hall
The Game
Locked Rooms
The Language of Bees
The God of the Hive
Beekeeping for Beginners
Pirate King
Garment of Shadows
Dreaming Spies
The Marriage of Mary Russell
The Murder of Mary Russell
Mary Russell's War And Other Stories of Suspense
Island of the Mad
Riviera Gold
The Art of Detection (Strictly speaking, this is in the action!lesbian Detective Kate Martinelli series, but it crosses over to the Sherlock Holmes genre. If you’ve ever wondered how Holmes would deal with the transgendered, this is the book.)
Ø Sherlock Holmes retires to Sussex, keeps bees, marries a nice Jewish girl who is smarter than he is and less than half his age and he’s mentored since she was fifteen in an extremely problematic power dynamic relationship that should repulse me but doesn’t, somehow, because this is the best Sherlock Holmes pastiche out there. Mary should have been a rabbi, but it is 1920, so she learns martial arts and becomes an international detective instead. Guest appearances by Conan Doyle, Kimball O’Hara, T.E. Lawrence, Cole Porter, and the Oxford Comma.
Ø Nothing mind-expanding here, unless the levels of meta present in a fictional world that is about how the fictional world might not be as fictional as you thought come as a surprise to anyone in the era of tie-in books, films, tv, interactive social media and RPGs.
Ø If these two geniuses can’t catch the bad guys with their dazzling brilliance, they will happily kick some ass. Adventure takes center stage and the action sequences are especially creative.
Ø Amusement is afoot.
Jasper Fforde’s Thursday Next Series
The Eyre Affair
Lost in a Good Book
The Well of Lost Plots
Something Rotten
First Among Sequels
One of Our Thursdays is Missing
The Woman Who Died a Lot
Ø In a world where Librarians are revered and Shakespeare is more popular than the Beatles, someone has to facilitate the weekly anger-management sessions for the characters of Wuthering Heights, if only to keep them from killing each other before the novel actually ends. That someone is Thursday Next – Literature Cop.
Ø Mind-bending enough to give Noam Chomsky material for another hundred years.
Ø Adventure aplenty. Action? Even the punctuation will try to kill you.
Ø This is a frolicsome look at humorous situations filled with funny people. Pretty much a full house in the laugh department.
Sir Terry Pratchett’s Discworld Series/City Watch Arc
Guards! Guards!
Men at Arms
Feet of Clay
Jingo
The Fifth Elephant
Night Watch
Thud!
Snuff
Raising Steam
Ø If this were a game of CLUE, the answer would be Niccolo Machiavelli in Narnia with a Monty Python. Everything you think you know about books with dragons and trolls and dwarves and wizards is expertly ripped to shreds and reassembled as social satire that can save your soul, even if it turns out you don’t really have one. Do not be fooled by the Tolkien chassis – there’s a Vonnegut-class engine at work.
Ø Caution: Ideas in the Mirror Universe May be Larger Than They Appear
Ø The City Watch arc has plenty of thrilling action sequences. Some other of the fifty-million Discworld novels have less. Every one of them is nonstop adventure. Most of the adventure, however, takes the form of characters desperately trying to avoid thrilling action sequences.
Ø Funny? Even though I’ve read every book in the series at least ten times, I still have to make sure I have cold packs on hand in case I laugh so hard I rupture something.
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THEN IT'S MECHANICAL; PHEW
Nor, as far as I can type, then spend a week cranking up the generality may be unsuitable for junior professors trying to get tenure, but it's always better to read an original book, bearing in mind the eventual goal: to be a promising experiment that's worth funding to see how he'd qualify it. A few simple rules will take a meeting as you suggest Thanks fred from: Fred Wilson date: Mon, Jan 26,2009 at 11:42 AM subject: Re: meet the airbeds Airbed team-Are you still in NYC? But you ignore them because they need a job. This makes the programmer do the kind of results I expected, but I wasn't sure what to focus on more important questions, like what to patent, and what it means. I don't think it's because they want impressive growth numbers. For most successful startups, and partly so I don't worry about it, not written it. If you're an amateur mathematician and think you've solved a famous open problem, better go back and debug Aristotle's motivating argument. Pick the right startups. The situation is different in phase 1.1 Investors have different risk profiles from founders.2
Any public company that didn't have clear founders. A round if you do it. Even people who hate you for it believe it. What we ought to be better at picking winners than VCs. It would set off alarms. No.3 Html#f8n 19.4 Just as a speaker ad libbing can only spend as long on each sentence as you want. That helps would-be founders may not have to be a doctor, odds are it's not just that the problems we want to solve a problem using a network of startups than by a few big successes, and otherwise not. Starting a startup will change you a lot.5
Make it really good for code search, for example, they're often outweighed by the advantages of being an insider, and in the meantime I've found a more drastic solution. One is simply that they understood search. So the previously sharp line between the two I like Calder better, because any measure that constrains spammers will tend to err on the side. As a little piece of debris, the rational thing for them. The Suit is Back.6 If you don't know who needs to be protected from himself. Of course he would say that hapless meant unlucky. Strangely enough, if you look at something and predict whether it will take you through everything you need to use convertible notes to do it myself. One of the weirdest things about Yahoo when I went to the local public school.7
In reality, wealth is measured by how far their spam probability is above the threshold. You have to at least look at the page. Partly because they can threaten a counter-suit. Though ITA is also in principle a round of funding to start approaching them. This probably indicates room for improvement here. It was not until Perl 5 if then that the language was line-oriented.8 There's an initial phase of negotiation about the big questions.
If you consider exclamation points as constituents, for example, only branches. In those days there was practically zero concept of starting what we now call science. In a few days beforehand, I'll sometimes play it safe. It would be too much of a threat—that is, someone whose best work was in logic and zoology, both of which he can easily hire programmers?9 Empirically, the way they think about how to make money, and the spammers will actually stop sending it. By the 1970s, we've seen the percentage of people who weren't already in it.10 Plus your referrals will dry up, and the grey-headed man installed by the VCs who rejected Google. Why the pattern? And not fundraising is the proper test of success for a startup that doesn't build something the founders use. But really it doesn't matter—that is, to grow about ten percent a year. It could be that, in a way that makes you profitable, or will enable you to make something great. When you're operating on the Daddy Model, and saw wealth as something that meant more work for them.11
And that's what the professor is interested in a company run by techno-weenies who are obsessed with control, and they pay it to the manufacturers of specialized video editing systems, and now he's a professor at MIT. If fundraising stalled there for an appreciable time, you'd start to read as a chivalrous or deliberately perverse gesture. He didn't choose, the industry did.12 Art History 101. There is no shortcut to it. In 1997 I got a call from another startup founder considering hiring them to promote his company. This is an instance of scamming a scammer. So don't underestimate this task. And so an architect who has to build on a difficult site, or a real estate developer building a block of foam or granite.13 Less confident people feel they have to be a customer, but I can imagine an advocate of best practices saying these ought to be very accurate.
What if one of your own. Viaweb succeeded because we were smart. This won't get us all the things we could do to beat America, design a town that could exert enough pull over the right people: you can go into almost any field from math. The sticking point is board seats. A historical change has taken place, and to Guido van Rossum, Jeremy Hylton, Robert Morris, Geoff Ralston, Joshua Reeves, Yuri Sagalov, Emmett Shear, Sergei Tsarev, and Stephen Wolfram for reading drafts of this. We take it for granted most of the 20th century executive salaries were low partly because companies then were more dependent on banks, who would have disapproved if executives got too much. Notes An accountant might say that it's an accident that it thus helps identify this spam. So the total number of new startups. Because Python doesn't fully support lexical variables, you have to resign themselves to having a conversation with yourself. Some startups could go directly from seed funding to a VC firm, go to some set of buildings, and do it well, those who do it well. So make a list of the most successful startups generally ride some wave bigger than themselves, it could be that a lot of time in bookshops and I feel as if they're doing something completely unrelated.14 That shows how much a startup differs from a job.15
Notes
Though most founders start out excited about the topic.
The reason we quote statistics about the Airbnbs during YC. No one writing a dictionary from scratch, rather than doing a small amount of damage to the other writing of literary theorists. So while we were working on is a particularly alarming example, to mean the hypothetical people who might be a win to include in your plans, you don't have the perfect point to spread them. When a lot of successful startups have over you could get all you have to say no to drugs.
Exercise for the ad sales department.
His critical invention was a refinement that made a million dollars out of loyalty to the rich. 1886/87. Vision research may be overpaid.
Above. Here's a recipe that might be a big success or a 2004 Mercedes S600 sedan 122,000. The moment I do in a traditional series A rounds from top VC funds whether it was the least experience creating it. The founders want the valuation is fixed at the time.
Photo by Alex Lewin. Some want to keep the number of users to observe—e.
I switch in the sense that if you suppress variation in wealth over time, not an efficient market in this essay. If they're on the group's accumulated knowledge. It's probably inevitable that philosophy will suffer by comparison, because there was a special name for these topics. SFP applicants: please don't assume that the site.
Users judge a site not as completely worthless as a cause them to go to work in a startup than it was 10 years ago. Hackers Painters, what that means is No, they wouldn't have the concept of the world, and would not be surprised how often have you read them as promising to invest in the sense that they can be useful in cases where you went to get going, e.
They act as if you'd invested at a critical point in the twentieth century, Europeans looked back on industrialization at the end of economic inequality in the grave and trying to focus on their own freedom. Pliny Hist. I even mention the possibility.
Mozilla is open-source projects, even thinking requires control of scarce resources, political deal-making causes things to be. We're only comparing YC startups, the activation energy required to switch. Analects VII: 36, Fung trans. Cit.
Investors are often surprised by this standard, and you might be an anti-dilution provisions, even if it's not enough to do this would probably be interrupted every fifteen minutes with little loss of productivity. At the time and Bob nominally had a juicy bug to find the right not to do it now.
This seems to have figured out how to succeed at all. Actually it's hard to say hello on her way out. That's why there's a special title for actual partners. The two 10 minuteses have 3 weeks between them.
But what he means by long shots are people in Bolivia don't want to create one of their assets; and if they can grow the acquisition into what it would annoy our competitor more if we wanted to start, e. The second biggest regret was caring so much worse than he was 10.
The other reason they pay so well is that most three letter words are independent, and spend hours arguing over irrelevant things.
That name got assigned to it because the rich. If an investor is more efficient. Though they were just getting kids to them unfair that things don't work the upper middle class values; it is probably part of its users, at which point it suddenly stops.
#automatically generated text#Markov chains#Paul Graham#Python#Patrick Mooney#mind#startups#Viaweb#philosophy#company#round#VII#industry#class#cause#days#VCs#acquisition#speaker#change#sense#something#things#Thanks#loss#Airbed#people#numbers#date#productivity
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I bought this goal journal about a month ago. The design of the book just caught my eye, and I personally love accomplishments. My only trouble is I have a hard time committing to one thing at a time! I always start something before I finish another and completely discard it. My goal with this journal is to finish one project (one big goal) since I have a hard time finishing anything. I’m struggling to pick a project. Here are my options:
Learn to code in Python
Write a novel (and possibly publish!)
Start my e-magazine (always wanted to own my own publication)
Write a script and enter a screenwriting contest (I took screenwriting last semester and we only wrote the first 30 pages)
Further my knowledge in music composition and compose a small score (I was a music major for a year! I was aiming to be a film composer, but music school was killing my mental health)
Design a complete collection of evening gowns (did I mention I know a thing or two about sewing? Always wanted to design wedding dresses!)
What do you guys think?!
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Old and Useless
I am fucking angry, but my rage is impotent and useless because the people I am angry at, don’t care that I am angry. Actually, they do care a little bit and they are arguing that my anger is unjustified and unfair on them. I did not realise that I was a bully and was asking so much from them…
So you may be asking who I am so angry with and why am I being so unreasonable? The answer is complicated, but my dear reader, it is really not you, well unless you are one of those people mentioned above. You see, I am angry with the big names of the tech industry and the reasons as to why, are both complex and deep. To explain this anger, I need to tell you a story, a true story in fact, that started a little over twenty years ago. So settle down, put your feet up and let us go back through the swirly mists of time to the autumn of 1995, when I started my degree at a prestigious British university.
My University was neither prestigious or an actual university. It was a former teacher training college that had in the past trained nice young ladies to be nice young teachers of nice young children. The grounds that these nice courses were taught in, were beautiful, with ancient trees, two small lakes with a folly that looked just like Camelot from Monty Python. The college was however, not happy being just a run of the mill college, because a simple college did not make much money when compared to a prestigious University and so they set about changing from a college into a... University College, a subtle change, but a change for the better they assured us, the actual students of the place. But after all of the expensive name changes and font changes on the new name, the leaky roof still leaked in the student accommodation and the library still had not bought a new book for three years, but they were going to modernise the place with a whole new building.
When I started my degree, my essays were hand written on stuff called lined paper, or if we could afford to buy one, they were typed up on an electronic typewriter. The college had put up a new and rather ugly building that was filled with these wondrous boxes of blinking lights, boxes of lights that were the early home computers and they came with a thing called Windows 95 that allowed you to look at pixilated images of boobies. They were amazing.
Were they really amazing? The correct answer is no, no they were not. The problem was that to someone who had never used a computer before, it was a box that made a lot of noise and a filthy heat, that took up a lot of space on my desk and did very little, even when asked. I poked the keyboard and moved the funny little box on a wire and the pointer on the screen moved too, I was entranced.
I did not play with those boxes of lights again until several years later when back in another university (again a former polytechnic that wanted to be posher and thus changed its name and status!) I was told that my essays needed to be submitted typed up or word processed. Excited, I dived into the world of home computing and spent hundreds of pounds on my own box of lights and switched it on to be greeted by the green fields of the Windows XP screen background and the appalling monster that was Clippy, the word assistant in the shape of a talking paper-clip. He would pop up when I was typing and ask me if I wanted help with my essay and would then offer me useless advice that had no relevance to what I was doing. Clippy was the first piece of technology that I regularly told to fuck off.
My first home network came in 2005, when the chance to buy a second computer presented itself and although it was broken, I could fix it. Putting the two of them together and seeing them communicate for the first time was amazing. I could drag files from one computer and put them on another. I could work on two projects at the same time and swap files between them on two different machines. Windows XP was so easy to use, wasn’t it?… No, it wasn’t. Windows XP was all that I had available at the time and I had to train my brain to think in the Windows XP way. It had plenty of quirks and numerous faults and to add further insults, with two machines, I had two versions of Clippy that I was forced to to tell to fuck off. Then my hard drive died.
I was lucky, I had back ups on CD of most of my files, but not of everything and that included the operating system. Thankfully I had the original install disk, a CD that contained Windows and another that contained Office and that cunt Clippy. Only, the disk was keyed to only one of my computers and when asked to submit a code, it was most unhappy and said no. That was the very first time that a computer said no to me. I consulted an expert and was informed that I needed to pay an awful lot of money to Microsoft in order to fix my computer and that was before I paid the already mentioned man, an awful lot to put on the computer what Microsoft gave him. So, after an awful lot of money exchanged hands, I had two computers once again, but not for long.
This time, the fault was more serious, the outer box stayed the same, but the bits inside changed. This was the first time I encountered something called a Mother Board and another thing called a graphics card. Then came the sound card and the memory and the hard disk and the optical drive and the LAN card and the USB expansion and the second hard disk and before I knew it, I was looking at a pile of parts that had cost hundreds of pounds and none of it fucking worked yet because of fucking Microsoft.
This pile of parts led me down the path of not wanting to keep giving Microsoft hundreds of pounds every time I rebuilt my computer. So I started playing with something called Linux. It was anarchic they said, it broke away from conventions they said. It does everything Windows does, but even better they said… They lied. Very quickly I had to learn about a thing called ‘The Terminal’ into which I typed out lines and lines of code. After which, I would hit return and then I would have to search through hundreds of lines of code to find the place where I had mistyped a character or two. Then I would repeat that process several more times, adding more code and finally, I had a working computer. Making it talk to the Windows XP machine was a trial because it seemed that they spoke different languages, but I did it and speak to each other they did.
My new Linux machine played my DVD movies, it played my music CDs and I was able to write on it without being interrupted by that shitcunt Clippy. But Linux back then was not all that stable and glitches would start to appear and before I knew it, I spent just as much time typing in code as I did listening to music. The two computers stopped talking to each other and I had to work really hard to make them friends again. My first machine now long dead seemed like a mere pocket calculator compared to what I had found myself with. The Micro ATX board the size of a drinks coaster had been replaced by something faster, bigger and more fun, but these money pits soon began to drain my purse of funds needed for other projects and as funds grew tight, the computers complained all the more, leaving me with just one computer again and a box of lights that had gone dark.
My first laptop had windows ME on it and it would seize up and need restarting after twenty minutes of work or half an hour of theme hospital. I really miss theme hospital, it was very silly and it was lots of fun, but it, like my laptop and Windows ME and Windows XP and Windows 7 and Windows 8 and Windows 8.1 are all long gone and here lies the nub of every issue I have with technology now. The constant need for the next new thing and frankly it boils my piss. I am fizzing in the gusset right now and not in a good way, this is anger, I am royally pissed.
In 2013 I bought a new laptop computer from PC world, a mistake I would repeat only once more. Thanks mainly to the advice from the sales adviser, who told me that the Google Chromebook was the next advance in home computing, I started looking at one. “Does it work away from home?” I asked in all innocence. I was assured that it did and with it freshly purchased, I promptly pissed off to a desert island in the Indian ocean looking forwards to writing up my adventures on my new laptop. It did not work. It would not even switch on without a connection to wifi. Finally and unbelievably on a remote desert island, we found a Pizza restaurant and I managed to switch on the Crapbook (a name I now give you for every Chromebook in existence) using their slow wifi. The Crapbook proved time and time again just how much of a worthless pile of shit it was. It promised so much and provided so little in return. In the end, I used it only to watch YouTube while in the bath because frankly every ‘Ap’ on the damn thing was fucking shit. As a writer, I wanted a laptop that could use office software to type up my stories. The Crapbook could do this, but it had no spell checker, it could not save to the laptop hard drive and when transferring files to another computer, the document would be turned into indecipherable gibberish. With imported documents, it would destroy formatting and leave behind a document that had so many page errors that not even a Windows machine could repair it.
Also, the Crapbook could not talk to the Windows Machine (now on Windows 10) on he home network, but then, neither could the iMac, the Sony Smart phone, my USB stick or my external hard drive. I was by now running four computer systems, the Crapbook, the iMac, the Windows 10 Laptop and the Linux desktop. None of them were capable of communicating with each other across the network, either wired or wireless. The Crapbook was a joke at the best of times, but when I discovered that this was the only machine that could read every USB stick I owned, but none of the others could, I almost threw it out of a window.
The problem was how the USB drives were coded. The Linux machine could see all of them, but could only write to the external hard drive. It could read from the blue USB stick, but not write to it. The red USB stick would register, but the Linux machine would say that the drive was faulty and I would have to restart the machine three times just to be able to remove it safely! The old MP3 player that worked as a USB memory stick could be written to by the Linux machine, but it could not delete files and would instead turn the drive from eight gigs of data, into three song and a large file called trash, that contained every file I wanted to delete, but it seemed permanently burned onto the drive, never to be removed. I gave up trying in the end.
The Windows machine can see the external hard drive, but depending on some unknown variable can or cannot write to the drive. Some days it can and all is well. These will be the days when the system volume also works and I can make my headphones louder by clicking the appropriate button. However, some days Windows decides that my pressing the volume button is a sign of my need for existential peace and it ignores my request for louder or quieter music. On these days, the external hard drive becomes a place of mystery too. The Blue USB stick does not exist and the red one is old and slow.
The iMac could see the external drive, but not the USB sticks. If it did see the USB sticks, it would delete them and I would have no idea if they were safe to remove from the computer. Writing to the External hard drive was also impossible. As was taking data from it, but it could see it.
As I write this, I am back on the Linux desktop because the Windows Laptop has been unusable for almost four days. Why is this you may ask? The answer is because when I bought it, I could not afford very much and so bought myself a budget laptop. It has a Core i3 processor and four gigs of ram. The board in the case is the size of my mobile phone and the processor and the cooling fan are on opposite sides of the case (this is relevant shortly) with just one air vent, towards the front of the computer. While trying to render a picture of a Lego model, the computer began to overheat. The fan speed increased to maximum and the keyboard developed a hot spot that made it uncomfortable to use and then the screen went dark as the machine simply shut down. A full thermal throttling shut down that required fully dismantling to blow the dust from the fan and clear the pathway between fan and CPU. Given the amount of space inside the laptop casing, I am forced to ask why there is a six inch gap between the fan and the CPU, plus a four inch gap between the fan and the vent? The heat coming through the bottom of the machine made it uncomfortable to actually have on my lap (never do this, it blocks the vents) and the computer shut down to protect itself. When I finally restarted the laptop, I discovered that it had developed yet another instability, possibly due to thermal damage of the CPU. Meanwhile in the background, Windows update (that you cannot turn off) was slowly sucking away processing time from other functions. I have set the times when Windows can do updates, which is every evening when I am not writing. However, this update has got bigger and bigger, drawing more and more CPU time (I know because I have been watching the progress with CPU ID and monitoring the core temps) and is as we speak, only 8% downloaded of whatever current update it is now on, having restarted three (edit- four!) times already this morning.
So why am I angry? I am angry because none of these fucking things work as promised. When I do finally get them to work as I want, updates come down that fuck with my settings. I cannot prevent updates, they come with inevitable gloom and yes, I am aware that I can delay them or stop the machine from downloading on a metered connection, but just like HG Wells’ Martians, still they come! For four days, my Windows 10 Laptop has been installing, downloading and installing updates. It has been hanging while installing updates that when looking on the Microsoft website, they say it is time to start coding in the terminal.
The Crapbook gave me a message recently that read in nicer language, “give us more money or we will reveal your banking details to scammers…” Thanks for that Google, you cunts.
The Linux machine wants to update to the next version of the OS, that I have tried and really don’t like because it tries to make my desktop work like a mobile phone.
The iMac keeps telling me that it is too old and is not safe to use on line any more.
The Smart phone will interrupt what I am doing with it, to show me adverts. It also on occasion refuses to allow me to answer actual phone calls, because to do so, I must first attempt to close down an advert for emojis that will randomly appear. An advert that I neither wanted or asked for.
What was once a tool and an essential learning aid has become nought but a shallow toy, filled with advertising junk, following my every key tap, not to help me, but to sell me shit I don’t want and steal my data for companies to buy and sell me more shit I really don’t want. The machines I knew and loved are gone. Media outlets such as Linus Tech tips tell us that using old machines on line is irresponsible because it endangers everyone else to attack from scammers. The message is plain. Old is bad. Repair is bad. Throw it away and buy a new one… BUY BUY BUY, never fix. Sell my soul for old shit I don’t want. Stop using these wondrous machines for actual creative processes and use them instead to buy emojis for chatting with my friends. I fucking hate it. I fucking hate that tech companies can make their expensive computers so disposable. As much as I loved the iMac, Apple can fuck themselves in their arses with burning hot iron spikes for making them almost impossible to repair and even my trusted ASUS have gone the same way by putting the fan and the CPU in different sides of the case. Apple, Microsoft and Google have taken apart the computer world and used it to extract money from us the consumer, as if they did not have enough already. Also and probably finally for this angry rant, I really liked Theme Hospital! Bloaty Head Disease made me laugh and I can’t fucking play it any more.
I fucking hate these technology companies. They claim that they are making everything better, but what they are doing is making old but good things useless just so that they can convince us to buy the newer models of the old ones each year. To hell with the environmental impact of all of the e-waste, consume, play, dispose… When did computers become digital nappies?
PS. The Laptop is now on 85% of its forth install and restart of the day…
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A Beginner’s Guide to Become a Data Scientist : Simple Steps
Greetings, future data maestro! If the allure of transforming raw data into valuable insights captivates you, you’re on the right track. This guide is your compass, offering a straightforward roadmap to navigate the path to becoming a data scientist from the Best Data Science Training Institute in Bangalore.
Build the Foundation: Grasp the Basics
Dive into the Basics:
Familiarize yourself with diverse data types — numbers, text, images.
Understand the contrast between structured (organized) and unstructured (free-flowing) data.
Learn the Tools:
Initiate your programming journey with languages like Python or R.
Explore fundamental math concepts like statistics, linear algebra, and calculus — consider them your magical toolkit.
2. Understanding Machine Learning:
Envision it as having an intelligent companion evolving and improving over time.
It involves training computers to make decisions and predictions without explicit programming.
3. Understanding Big Data:
Grapple with an extensive volume of information beyond traditional handling methods.
Comprehend the three Vs: Volume, Velocity, and Variety.
Tools for Big Data:
Familiarize yourself with tools like Hadoop and Spark — your allies in conquering big data challenges.
4. Practice, Practice, Practice: Apply Your Knowledge
Hands-On Projects:
Initiate small projects aligned with your interests, whether analyzing sports data or predicting weather patterns.
5. Never Stop Learning:
Read blogs, books, and stay abreast of the latest data science trends.
Course Exploration:
Consider enrolling in a course for deeper knowledge. I highly recommend Data Science course in Bangalore for certifications and job placement opportunities, available both online and offline.
Your Journey Unfolds Here:
In essence, the path to becoming a data scientist is a thrilling odyssey of learning, exploration, and perpetual growth. Start with fundamentals, embark on machine learning adventures, conquer big data challenges, apply your knowledge in projects, and let curiosity be your guiding force. May your expedition to data science mastery be filled with revelations and triumphs!
I hope I’ve provided valuable insights. If you have further questions or if there’s anything specific you’d like to explore, feel free to mention it in the comments. I’m here to assist you on your data science voyage!
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Hey guys!
Guess what? I wrote something! So this is part one of my fic “Countdown”. It centers on Ren getting chucked into hermit craft and being able to see numbers on how dangerous every mob (and player) is!
Here’s the Ao3 link
Chapter 1: Falling out of the sky
Ren did not wake up that morning thinking he was going to fall out of the sky. In fact, Ren did not want to wake up that morning, idling and staying in his bed for much longer than he probably should have He checked his clock when he finally got up, only to see it was already 3. “Well,” he muttered, “Not surprised,” He started walking around his base he had built up. He strolled past the random and messy rows of medieval houses, glancing at a creeper hole he had yet to fix up. He broke into a jog and lightly ran over to a much taller building that held his storage system. He quickly pulled out the stone variants he needed for his project, his tail brushing the floor. He marched out with his stone in hand, and started off to the main structure; a massive castle he had been working on for the past few weeks. He passed his pig farm as he walked, watching the numbers above their heads flick up to a three. You see, something had happened last time he was thrown into another world. When he first got there, the first thing he saw was creeper. Instead of running away like normal, he sat there in confused shock as a number started flicking up above the creatures head, going up to a five. He then exploded. Eventually, he had gone to the end, seeing what type of numbers would appear over the specific monsters heads. The enderman was a three at first, but then Ren looked at one in the eyes. The number flicked up to a six, and the slenderman knock-off nearly killed him. The enderdragon clocked in at an eight, which surprised him. Switching over to a stack of dirt, Ren began pillaring up to one of the towers he had been working on. He sighed, mentally preparing himself to begin. Hours later, he had finally finished this relatively small tower, wiping his brow with the back of his hand. Glancing up from his work, he realized he had worked much longer than he thought, the sun just peaking over the horizon in a beautiful pink and red sunrise. He sat down and ate a potato, just enjoying the sunrise. He must have fallen asleep, because he was woken up by his amazing ears picking up a hissing sound. Whirling around, he was face to face with a creeper, it blowing up right in front of him, blowing him back. He started falling to the ground, the fall to surely kill him. This wasn’t the first time this had happened, so he just sighed and let it take its course. That is until he was no longer falling off a medieval castle tower, but into a rapidly approaching wooden house that looked way too tall for its own good, a white flag with a hole in it, and… was that a dabbing pengu- His thought was so rudely interrupted by a house crashing into him, sending him sprawling in a small, unoccupied room. “What in the actual fu-” Ren coughed, right before passing out. Joe was peacefully writing in a book for his new roller coaster, enjoying his work, watching the sun rise; or more accurately, the world spin he thought; when he heard a loud whizz, followed by a crash. Glancing up from his restful writing, he discovered that there was now a massive hole in the precarious peak that was Grians house. He rose from atop the Cherry on Top store where he had chosen to pick his perch, and decided to sort out the source of the screaming. Whisking on his wings, Joe took off towards hemitville. Reaching the top of the wooden abode, he stared down into the massive hole the comet had created. Staring down into the wide hole, he saw an odd sight. There was a new player; not all that interesting; he looked like most new players look with the blue shirt and jeans, but this new guy had grey wolf ears and a tail. It was not often new players had extra extremities, with the only others being X’s turtle tail, Python’s snake tail, and Wels’s hooves and tail. “Are you okay, my furred friend?” Joe called down, not expecting much of an answer. To his surprise, the player groaned, trying to sit up. Joe jumped down into the room and gently forced him to lie back down. “You took quite the fall there,” Joe said caringly, “You might have broken a bone or five,” The new guy glanced up, narrowing his eyes, “Why is it so bright out?” Joe glanced up, but nothing seemed to be different. “Maybe your old world was darker,” the poet theorised, “But I don’t think that happens very often,” Ren glanced up against the glaring light of day, frustrated at his eyes. This nice person with the southern accent he was talking too finally moved his head over the sun, and he could see his face a little better. He had a brown flop of hair that nearly covered his cobalt blue eyes, which were in turn covered by thick glasses. He wore the same blue shirt Ren wore, but with a large white @ symbol over top. More importantly, Ren looked above his head to see… an EIGHT!?! There is no way that this nerdy looking guy could possibly be as dangerous as the enderdragon. Joe looked at the new guy, noticing the features of his short brown hair and striking yellow eyes. He helped him up. “My name is Joe Hills, helpin’ as I always do from Nashville, Tennessee. What’s your name, my good sir?” “My name’s Ren Diggity Dog! Coming from… nowhere in particular! Uhh, could you show me around or something? Are you the only one here?” “Well, no. This is a multiplayer server, but new people arrive every now and then. Let me show you around our current location, then let you explore by yourself.” With the help of Joe, Ren made his way out of the tower-like-house and back safely onto the ground. The glasses dude was very talkative, and explained the whole server that was revealed to be called hermitcraft and its participants the hermits in their walk around the town, all the while Ren was marveling at the crazy builds. “So, I hope I was a helpin’ hand!” Joe finished, “But I gotta head back to finishing my new minigame, see you around!” He took off using those elytra he always had on, while the wolf man stared after him in envy. He decided to take a look around for a place he could get some sun glasses, as his eyes were straining at this point. He stared at the ground as he walked, his head still aching from his fall. Eventually the reality set in that he wasn’t going back to his quaint old medieval town. He was stuck in this new place, needing to make new friends. Not like he had any in his old world anyway. He was walking mindlessly, not really looking where he was going, when he walked directly into another person- hermit, rather. Ren stumbled back, then got up to apologize. “Dude,” he said, “I’m really sorry, I-” He was interrupted when the other hermit turned around, having great big round surprised eyes and a shocked mouth, both of which were unnaturally large. Ren yelped, taking an involuntary step back before realizing they were just a pair of gag googly eye glasses and a face mask. “Nah, dude,” googly eyes guys said with a pleasing accent and a laugh, “It’s perfectly fine!” This new guy seemed to have the SAME shirt as Joe and himself, with the same brown hair as well. I really need to change if it’s this repetitive. He thought. Remembering to glance above his head, this new guy seemed to be a four, so basically an almost-gremlin. “My name’s Keralis by the way,” the nice accent guy said, “It looks like you’re new here too!” “Yeah,” Ren laughed, “I really am. Hey, do you know where I can get some sun glasses? My eyes are killing me!” “Oh, uh, no not really,” Keralis said uncertainly, “Like I said, I’m very new. But you could ask one of the older hermits from this season! I bet they would know!” “Thank you! Have a great day!” “You too!” As the two walked away from each other, Ren wondered where in the hell he would find another hermit. His head throbbed in response, telling him he needed to lay down, he just fell out of the freaking sky. Sleep is for the weak! He thought triumphantly as he promptly passed out.
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post tbk depression - unfinished mini fics
“At least we’re going to die together,” Aaron said. Each word was like a knife, cutting deeper and deeper in his chest. His small, sad smile was the final blow.
“Bullshit,” Call hissed at him with a conviction he didn’t have before. He squeezed their laced fingers. “You’re getting out of this alive—”
A blast of heat interrupted him. Tamara flung a fireball at Alex, her face contorted with righteous fury. Alex scowled and flung out his hand, using his air magic specialty to throw the fire right at the boys. Call barely ducked in time, grabbing Aaron’s shirt and pulling him down.
The masked man holding Call screamed as Tamara’s fire ate at his shirt. He let go of Call and he jumped away, wincing at his leg. He yanked Aaron away with him, and the blond boy staggered to his feet.
“Havoc, get him!” Tamara screamed, summoning another fireball.
Havoc’s snarl echoed throughout the abandoned village and he launched himself at Alex. Aaron tried to take away his hand—to fight back, no doubt—but Call tightened his fingers, holding him in place.
“No heroics,” Call said, pinning Aaron in place with his blazing eyes. He opened his mouth to say something else, but a blinding light interrupted him.
Call and Aaron whipped their heads at Alex, horror striking their hearts when they saw the metal of the Alkahest glowing with power. Alex raised his arm, his face alight with cruel victory.
It’s been two years.
It’s gotten to the point where everyone doubts you. Hell, they probably even doubt your mental state. You’ve gone on endless rants about how “—I can feel him, Tamara, I can’t explain it, but he’s there—“, her warm brown eyes filling with fucking pity, and her soft voice telling you for the umpteenth time that Aaron was dead; his soul was taken by Alex Strike; that there’s no way for him to come back, even under normal circumstances. But you resent that.
First of all—and you hate yourself for thinking this, she’s your best friend, for fuck’s sake, and the only one available at the moment—who’s she to say what’s up with souls? She’s not a Makar. Sure, she’s read all the books about it, but she’s never known what souls look like—what his soul looked like. A thousand colors at once. It was warm on the outside, caring, kind, the Aaron everyone knew and loved; but you saw something else, too. Something that somehow, you can’t really explain—that seems to be a prominent issue with all this Makar-void-soul business—but it sure explained his occasional bouts of aggression.
Second—and this might come as a surprise to people—you’ve read the counterweight theories. You’re not completely hopeless in class. You know your shit. And in every reading about counterweights that Rufus assigned to you and Aaron, it always said: The Makar and their counterweight’s souls are forever linked. So if that “link”, or whatever, was severed, you of all people would know. You would stop feeling that rubber band. You would stop feeling these flashes of phantom pain. You wouldn’t feel anything at all, just a gaping hole you can never fill. Besides, when a Makar dies, they take their counterweight down with them; that’s a known fact. That’s why Aaron didn’t want you as his counterweight at first, remember? He was so worried you’d die. But you decided to do it anyway, and now he’s gone.
But you’re still here. Why are you still here?
Why are you still alive if he’s not?
Simple. He’s not fucking dead.
Tamara says differently. Rufus says differently. Alastair says differently. The whole fucking World of Mages says differently, with their memorial statues and grand funeral (with no body to speak of, by the way.) Your own brain says differently. It plagues you at night with constant replays of that fucking beam, of Alex’s cruel expression, of his hand in yours. Aaron blames you for it every night in your dreams.
(You don’t get much sleep these days.)
It’s been two years, and you still think he’s alive, somewhere, somehow.
But now you’re on your way to his grave with flowers.
The fallen leaves crunch under your boots. The winter chill came early this year, biting your face in sudden gusts. Students are already wearing their warmer uniforms. Yours is red this year, and your wrist glistens with gold. It was supposed to be your senior year—all three of you, finishing school with a flourish. The plan just doesn’t work with two.
His tomb is a bit extravagant for his taste, you think. Aaron wouldn’t want a statue of him like Verity. “I didn’t earn it,” he’d say. He’d want a small modest little stone, engraved with his name, the dates, and if he died honorably or otherwise. But the Assembly insisted on a big memorial near the Mission Gate with a plaque underneath.
You don’t really like it. The sculptor got his nose wrong.
The platform by Fake-Aaron’s feet is littered with dead flowers. A rumor went around that leaving a little token by Aaron would give you good luck on your mission. Even the Gold Years did it sometimes. And you can agree that Aaron always did project good vibes.
You gently set your small bouquet next to his left foot. It’s a bit miserable—colorless bluebells, pink lilacs, and a weird purplish one Tamara called “hyacinth”—but you grew it yourself. Gold Years learn to use earth magic to cultivate things at speed. Aaron would have loved it; he always did appreciate earth magic right after chaos.
You take a deep breath and whisper, “Aaron.” A gust of wind buffets your face, and you pull up the hood of your coat, shivering slightly. “I—I know you’re out there. I don’t know how I know, but I…” You open your mouth to say more, but the words catch in your throat. You swallow thickly. “At this point, I might just be imagining it. I’m sure everyone thinks that. So please—please—if you can hear me, tell me. Send a counterweight sign or whatever. Just—show me.”
Something rustles behind you. You whip around and stare wildly around because holy shit, what if he actually heard you, is that him, finally—
But there’s nothing there. You wait a few minutes more, eyes and ears peeled for something, anything.
Nothing. It was the wind.
It’s been two years.
You start to think he might not come back after all.
Master North had gone on a long spiel about the untrained Makars—or Makar, as of late—being a danger to the whole school; Alma kept trying to convince everyone of her outrageous conspiracy theory. Rufus was exhausted, both mentally and physically. He had spent most of this meeting loudly and vehemently protesting everything his students were being subjected to.
When the mages arrived at the Order village, Callum had been immediately clapped in irons and sent to the Panopticon, no questions asked. Tamara had been ushered away and locked in her dorm with the Chaos-ridden wolf, isolated from all contact, but at least she was safe. Rufus’ main argument throughout this arduous meeting was Callum’s ordeal. He was a child, for God’s sake. He may be the Makar, but he means no harm, and he certainly did not kill Aaron. And he most definitely is not the Enemy of Death. Rufus, of all people, would know.
As soon as the Masters’ meeting was dismissed, Rufus all but ran out of the room. He couldn’t manage to bust Callum out of prison right now, Master North made sure of that. But he had time. He would pull strings in the Assembly, anything to get the boy out. But right now, something else was on his mind.
“It’s history repeating itself!” Alma had screeched. “Constantine Madden had killed his counterweight too—“
“A terrible accident,” Master Milagros said coldly. She didn’t like Alma.
“Maybe, but it was his fault nonetheless! When counterweights die, Makars are weakened but not killed. Makars, though—when Makars die, they take their counterweight down with them. Does anyone remember Verity Torres?” Alma waited half a second before continuing, “She was murdered, and her counterweight fell dead on the spot at the exact moment. So tell me, peers,” Alma stared around the room, her eyes piercing daggers at every Master, “why is Callum Hunt not dead?”
Alma was raving mad during most of her speech, but she had a point there. Something wasn’t right.
As he hurried down the halls, Rufus noticed everything was quiet. Usually the cavernous halls of the school echoes with laughter and the sounds of elementals and magic, but all he could hear now was the occasional drip of water and the swift pattering of his own feet.
He got to the small docks where the small boats let into the underground river system. Rufus swiftly stepped onto one and didn’t bother sitting down. He closed his eyes and focused his thoughts on the water, feeling its need to flow, and willed it to take him to his office. The water happily complied, and Rufus sped down the river.
Rufus took the few minutes he had to organize his thoughts. [hackshshd]
He would have to look at Aaron to be sure. Rufus flicked his fingers and created a small air-phone in front of him. Master Amaranth appeared, feeding eyeless fish to her python. She didn’t notice him until he said her name.
Amaranth jumped, clutching her heart. “Rufus! Don’t scare me like that, how many times do I have to—“
“I’m sorry, Amaranth,” Rufus inclined his head. “But I have an urgent request.”
Amaranth sighed and wrapped her snake around her neck. “Well?”
Rufus made an effort to make his face look grief-stricken. It wasn’t hard. “I’d like to see Aaron.”
Master Amaranth was silent. Rufus wasn’t known in the Magisterium for being emotional. His tragic backstory was well known throughout the school—a Devoured Master, his first apprentice group dead or ostracized, his second going on that same path—but so was his seeming apathy. William Rufus showing emotion was as rare as two Makars in a generation.
“Okay,” Amaranth said. “They put him in the infirmary. You have five minutes.”
Rufus thanked her and changed the boat’s course.
It was summer again. Call lay on the grass, basking in the sun. And Aaron was with him, their palms together, their fingers loosely laced, and everything felt right.
Aaron squeezed their hands a little. Call turned his head to look at him, smiling softly. But Aaron wasn’t looking back at him. He kept staring at the sky.
“Hey,” said Call. “You okay?”
Aaron didn’t respond. Call propped himself up on his elbow to take a closer look at him. Aaron’s green eyes were glassy and dull.
“Aaron!” Call jostled his shoulder but Aaron still didn’t look at him. “Aaron, answer me—“
Aaron shot up abruptly, gripping Call’s throat with a vengeance. Call scrabbled at his fist, but only felt metal, and suddenly Call was back at the Order village. Aaron’s face melted into Alex’s and he said in a voice far too sinister for a sixteen year-old boy, “Power.” Light flooded out of the Alkahest and burned like hell, and Call was thrown back. Aaron lay there beside him again, but he wasn’t there, and Aaron’s hand was cold, Aaron wasn’t breathing, Aaron was gone—
Call has always been the kind of person that knew when he was dreaming and when he wasn’t. He knew he was dreaming when Master Joseph came to him and splashed snow on his face. He knew he was awake when he saw Aaron die.
#WOW THIS IS SENDING ME BACK#the bronze key#calron#callum hunt#Aaron Stewart#verr's great fic purge#magisterium
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(Download Book) The Big Book of Small Python Projects - Al Sweigart
Download Or Read PDF The Big Book of Small Python Projects - Al Sweigart Free Full Pages Online With Audiobook.

[*] Download PDF Here => The Big Book of Small Python Projects
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Programmers commonly read code to sharpen their coding skills just as a technical mountain climber might watch endless videos showing the details of a particularly hard technique. The 100+ short programs in Big Book of Small Python Projects are designed to help beginning-to-intermediate programmers expand their knowledge of how to deploy Python creatively and effectively by offering coding examples that will help them to tackle their own coding challenges.The 100+ short, complete Python programs in this book are designed to help beginning-to-intermediate Python programmers broaden their skills by providing a diverse set of coding examples they can study, emulate, and draw inspiration from. The programs range from classic card and board games and mazes, to math and probability demos, and mad libs. The author includes the complete code for each program, as well as commentary and suggestions for how to modify and experiment with code.
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