This 504 page book teaches Python programming to automate tedious tasks and “do in minutes what would take hours.” Written by Al Sweigart for complete beginners, readers learn Python by writing scripts for practical tasks like finding/changing text, manipulating documents and spreadsheets, web automation, and more.
Recommended for: Beginner-to-intermediate readers. This book is suitable for those with no prior programming experience as well as those who have some familiarity with coding but want to expand their Python skills.
You will:
- Learn how to use Python to automate a variety of tedious, time-consuming tasks
- Discover techniques for working with files, web scraping, manipulating spreadsheets, and more
- Gain practical programming experience through hands-on projects and practice exercises
- Develop problem-solving skills and the ability to break down complex tasks into smaller, manageable steps
- Explore the versatility of Python and how it can be applied to a wide range of automation and productivity tasks
Detailed overview
Through engaging examples and projects, early chapters explain Python basics like variables, lists, dictionaries, and control flow. Useful modules like regular expressions, CSV/JSON file processing, operating system interaction, and automatically sending emails are covered. Readers acquire computational thinking, debugging skills, and understand how to break down problems into Python code.
Later sections build interactive programs involving web scraping, file renaming, spreadsheet editing, and downloading online content. More advanced topics include creating GUI programs and games using the Tkinter module. Making programs run at startup or on a schedule is demonstrated.
Freely available in an open format, the book presents Python as an easy way to solve tedious tasks and experiment with programming. Complete beginners with no background can pick it up and start automating workflows. While focused on practicality over theory, the material provides a solid foundation before more advanced Python topics.
Overall the engaging tutorials, compelling automated tasks, and guidance on breaking problems into parts make Automate the Boring Stuff an excellent self-guided introduction to programming for beginners looking to expand their skills and productivity.
Citation
Sweigart, A. (2015). Automate the Boring Stuff with Python. No Starch Press. https://automatetheboringstuff.com/
Licensing
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 3.0 License. The full text of the license is available at https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/.
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