Python 3.1 / 2.6.1

Fans of Python use the phrase "batteries included" to describe the standard library, which covers everything from asynchronous processing to zip files. The language itself is a flexible powerhouse that can handle practically any problem domain. Build your own web server in three lines of code. Build flexible data-driven code using Pythons powerful and dynamic introspection capabilities and advanced language features such as meta-classes, duck typing and decorators.

Python lets you write the code you need, quickly. And, thanks to a highly optimized byte compiler and support libraries, Python code runs more than fast enough for most applications.

Major Features:

1. Very clear, readable syntax
2. strong introspection capabilities
3. Intuitive object orientation
4. Natural expression of procedural code
5. Full modularity, supporting hierarchical packages
6. Exception-based error handling
7. Very high level dynamic data types
8. Extensive standard libraries and third party modules for virtually every task
9. Extensions and modules easily written in C, C++ (or Java for Jython, or .NET languages for IronPython)
10. Embeddable within applications as a scripting interface
11. Python is powerful... and fast
    • Fans of Python use the phrase "batteries included" to describe the standard library, which covers everything from asynchronous processing to zip files. The language itself is a flexible powerhouse that can handle practically any problem domain. Build your own web server in three lines of code.
12. Python plays well with others
    • Python can integrate with COM, .NET, and CORBA objects.
    • For Java libraries, use Jython, an implementation of Python for the Java Virtual Machine.
    • For .NET, try IronPython , Microsoft's new implementation of Python for .NET, or Python for .NET.
13. Python runs everywhere
    • Python is available for all major operating systems: Windows, Linux/Unix, OS/2, Mac, Amiga, among others.
      
14. Python is friendly... and easy to learn
    • The Python newsgroup is known as one of the friendliest around. The avid developer and user community maintains a wiki, hosts international and local conferences, runs development sprints, and contributes to online code repositories.
15. Python is Open
    • The Python implementation is under an open source license that makes it freely usable and distributable, even for commercial use. The Python license is administered by the Python Software Foundation.

Enhancements

• Regular Python dictionaries iterate over key/value pairs in arbitrary order. Over the years, a number of authors have written alternative implementations that remember the order that the keys were originally inserted. Based on the experiences from those implementations, a new collections.OrderedDict class has been introduced.
• The OrderedDict API is substantially the same as regular dictionaries but will iterate over keys and values in a guaranteed order depending on when a key was first inserted. If a new entry overwrites an existing entry, the original insertion position is left unchanged. Deleting an entry and reinserting it will move it to the end.
• The standard library now supports use of ordered dictionaries in several modules. The configparser module uses them by default. This lets configuration files be read, modified, and then written back in their original order. The _asdict() method for collections.namedtuple() now returns an ordered dictionary with the values appearing