#433 Dev in the Arena
Python Bytes
Exploring Testing and Monitoring Tools in Python
This chapter focuses on practical software testing in Python using the PyTest framework and introduces NeoHTOP, a versatile system monitoring tool. The discussion also covers Pyrefly, a fast type checker by Facebook Meta, contrasting it with other type checkers while emphasizing its features and implications for Python development.
- git-flight-rules
- Uravelling t-strings
- neohtop
- Introducing Pyrefly: A new type checker and IDE experience for Python
- Extras
- Joke
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Michael #1: git-flight-rules
- What are "flight rules"?
- A guide for astronauts (now, programmers using Git) about what to do when things go wrong.
- Flight Rules are the hard-earned body of knowledge recorded in manuals that list, step-by-step, what to do if X occurs, and why. Essentially, they are extremely detailed, scenario-specific standard operating procedures. [...]
- NASA has been capturing our missteps, disasters and solutions since the early 1960s, when Mercury-era ground teams first started gathering "lessons learned" into a compendium that now lists thousands of problematic situations, from engine failure to busted hatch handles to computer glitches, and their solutions.
- Steps for common operations and actions
Brian #2: Uravelling t-strings
- Brett Cannon
- Article walks through
- Evaluating the Python expression
- Applying specified conversions
- Applying format specs
- Using an Interpolation class to hold details of replacement fields
- Using Template class to hold parsed data
- Plus, you don’t have to have Python 3.14.0b1 to try this out.
- The end result is very close to an example used in PEP 750, which you do need 3.14.0b1 to try out.
- See also:
- I’ve written a pytest version, Unravelling t-strings with pytest, if you want to run all the examples with one file.
Michael #3: neohtop
- Blazing-fast system monitoring for your desktop
- Features
- Real-time process monitoring
- CPU and Memory usage tracking
- Beautiful, modern UI with dark/light themes
- Advanced process search and filtering
- Pin important processes
- Process management (kill processes)
- Sort by any column
- Auto-refresh system stats
Brian #4: Introducing Pyrefly: A new type checker and IDE experience for Python
- From Facebook / Meta
- Another Python type checker written in Rust
- Built with IDE integration in mind from the beginning
- Principles
- Performance
- IDE first
- Inference (inferring types in untyped code)
- Open source
- I mistakenly tried this on the project I support with the most horrible abuses of the dynamic nature of Python, pytest-check. It didn’t go well. But perhaps the project is ready for some refactoring. I’d like to try it soon on a more well behaved project.
Extras
Brian:
- Python: The Documentary Official Trailer
- Tim Hopper added Setting up testing with ptyest and uv to his “Python Developer Tooling Handbook”
- For a more thorough intro on pytest, check out courses.pythontest.com
- pocket is closing, I’m switching to Raindrop
- I got one question about code formatting. It’s not highlighted, but otherwise not bad.
Michael:
- New course! Polars for Power Users: Transform Your Data Analysis Game
- Apache Airflow 3.0 Released
- Paste 5
Joke: Theodore Roosevelt’s Man in the Arena, but for programming
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