Python & XML (Paperback)

by Christopher Jones (Author), Fred Drake (Author), Christopher A. Jones (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Review
"I'll use the word 'practical' again, because that sums up the tone of this book - it's about getting things done, and shows the processes in easy to understand chunks. There aren't great swathes of waffle, but there are plenty of examples. Appendices cover installation of necessary tools and the APIs for SAX and DOM, as well as a guide to MSXML and other Python tools available. Even the index is more comprehensive that the usual effort. Over 340 pages of real, practical, useful info here, well worth reading." - Nick Veitch, LinuxFormat, May 2002 "...does a great job of sticking to real-world, practical applications of these cutting edge technologies." - Martin Howse, LinuxUser & Developer, issue 31

Product Description
As an object-oriented language with powerful text processing capabilities, Python is an ideal language for manipulating XML. Python & XML provides you with a solid foundation for using these two languages together. Loaded with practical examples, the book highlights common application tasks, so that you can learn by doing. The book starts with the basics then quickly progresses to complex topics, like transforming XML with XSLT, querying XML with XPath, and working with XML dialects and validation. It also covers the more advanced issues, such as SOAP and distributed web services, and explores the use of Python to create scalable XML streams between distributed applications. If you are a Python programmer who wants to incorporate XML into your skill set, this is the book for you.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 450 pages
• Publisher: O'Reilly Media, Inc.; 1st edition (December 15, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0596001282
• ISBN-13: 978-0596001285
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 7 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #224,666 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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  #52 in	Books > Computers & Internet > Programming > Languages & Tools > Python
  #53 in	Books > Computers & Internet > Programming > Languages & Tools > XML

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great coverage with some typos, February 28, 2002

By	Sunit Joshi (Madison, AL United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This book really dvelves into the using XML with Python. The
chapter are well laid out and easy to read. There are some typos
but nothing that you can't fix. There are some problems using the current XSLT processer that ships with PyXml0.7 but you can
still apply the concepts (I used MSXML's XSLT). The best chapter (last one (:-|) ties all the concepts explained into a Web Service like app. that really shows the real strength of XML

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Good Coverage of Python XML possibilities, January 31, 2002

By A Customer

I really liked this book because I was able to quickly start using XML with Python. I tried to use the package docs, but they were often hard to read, and didn't fill me in on the background stuff I needed to know. The examples in this book were easy to understand, and easy to see how to make practical applications from them. I didn't encounter any typos like the other reader did.

24 of 37 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Terse, and too many typos!, January 14, 2002

By	Mario Diana "http://blog.mariodiana.com" (Poughquag, NY USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I'm not very far along in the book, but I don't like what I'm seeing.
The preface purports that the book's audience need not "know anything
about XML." There is very little in the way of explaining XML, however.
The chapter on "Fundamentals" is O'Reilly at its most terse. If you already
understand XML very well, you might think this chapter an excellent
itemizing of the specification. Sadly, most people, I imagine, would be able
to retain little from this.

Regarding the code examples, the explanations hardly illuminate the API.
The code stands as is; and the commentary does only a somewhat decent job
of explaining the larger context. You could always check the documentation
given in the back of the book, but that's hardly as helpful as a good overview
and commentary.

Moreover, and in some ways worse, I have found many typos -- and I am only
as far as the first two examples. These mistakes include missing import
statements, errant capitalization, bad indentation, double underscores ('__')
written as one long underscore. This is unacceptable. I can only hope it is just
this one chapter.

I bought this book because of the topics, and because I figured Python would
be the easiest way to learn XML API's. I am only hoping that the book will
get better, and that I will be able to derive benefit from it. As it stands,
I'm skeptical that I will get my money's worth.