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PYTHON OVERVIEW
Pythonis a high-level, interpreted, interactive and object-oriented scripting language. Pythonwas designed to
be highly readable whichuses Englishkeywords frequently where as other languages use punctuationand it has
fewer syntacticalconstructions thanother languages.
Python is Interpreted: This means that it is processed at runtime by the interpreter and youdo not
need to compile your programbefore executing it. This is similar to PERL and PHP.
Python is Interactive: This means that youcanactually sit at a Pythonprompt and interact withthe
interpreter directly to write your programs.
Python is Object-Oriented: This means that Pythonsupports Object-Oriented style or technique of
programming that encapsulates code withinobjects.
Python is Beginner's Language: Pythonis a great language for the beginner programmers and
supports the development of a wide range of applications fromsimple text processing to WWW browsers
to games.
History of Python:
Pythonwas developed by Guido vanRossuminthe late eighties and early nineties at the NationalResearch
Institute for Mathematics and Computer Science inthe Netherlands.
Pythonis derived frommany other languages, including ABC, Modula-3, C, C++, Algol-68, SmallTalk, and Unix
shelland other scripting languages.
Pythonis copyrighted. Like Perl, Pythonsource code is now available under the GNU GeneralPublic License
(GPL).
Pythonis now maintained by a core development teamat the institute, althoughGuido vanRossumstillholds a vital
role indirecting its progress.
Python Features:
Python's feature highlights include:
Easy-to-learn: Pythonhas relatively few keywords, simple structure, and a clearly defined syntax. This
allows the student to pick up the language ina relatively short period of time.
Easy-to-read: Pythoncode is muchmore clearly defined and visible to the eyes.
Easy-to-maintain: Python's success is that its source code is fairly easy-to-maintain.
A broad standard library: One of Python's greatest strengths is the bulk of the library is very
portable and cross-platformcompatible onUNIX, Windows and Macintosh.
Interactive Mode: Support for aninteractive mode inwhichyoucanenter results froma terminalright
to the language, allowing interactive testing and debugging of snippets of code.
Portable: Pythoncanrunona wide variety of hardware platforms and has the same interface onall
platforms.
Extendable: Youcanadd low-levelmodules to the Pythoninterpreter. These modules enable
programmers to add to or customize their tools to be more efficient.
Databases: Pythonprovides interfaces to allmajor commercialdatabases.
GUI Programming: Pythonsupports GUI applications that canbe created and ported to many system
calls, libraries and windows systems, suchas Windows MFC, Macintoshand the X Window systemof
Unix.

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Scalable: Pythonprovides a better structure and support for large programs thanshellscripting.
Apart fromthe above-mentioned features, Pythonhas a big list of good features, few are listed below:
Support for functionaland structured programming methods as wellas OOP.
It canbe used as a scripting language or canbe compiled to byte-code for building large applications.
Very high-leveldynamic data types and supports dynamic type checking.
Supports automatic garbage collection.
It canbe easily integrated withC, C++, COM, ActiveX, CORBA and Java.