Rating: 
Summary: An excellent, concise Python reference
Review: Intending to familiarize myself with Python, I picked up a copy of O'Reilly's Programming Python a couple of years ago. After an initial attempt at going through the book, it has been on my book shelf since. It was simply not organized in a fashion that allowed me to quickly pick up the essentials of the language.As someone who was already familiar with C/C++ and Perl, but wanting to learn Python, the Python Essential Reference was exactly what I was looking for. Yes, most of the information contained in the book is available in the Python reference documents, but not collected in one place. In addition to adding examples from his own experience, David Beazley has done an excellent job in concisely summarizing the built-in features of the language as well as providing a nicely indexed library reference. While this book may not be immediately useful for someone looking specifically for a language tutorial, beginning or advanced Python programmers will get useful information from this book for much longer than most tutorial style books. Highly recommended.
Rating:
Summary: A great Python resource
Review: The author did a great job of including a ton of information in a clear and succinct reference. This is not a book that will teach a newbie all about programming. However, it is perfect for those that have at least some programming experience, whether in Python or some other language, and need a reference while coding in Python.
For those new to the language who find themselves wondering "How do I do that in Python?", the first chapter includes a short (11 page) tutorial that demonstrates using:
- Variables
- Conditionals
- File I/O
- Strings
- Lists & Tuples
- Loops
- Dictionaries
- Functions
- Classes
- Exceptions
- Modules
The tutorial section is nice while getting up to speed with Python's syntax.
The rest of the book goes into a bit more detail on rest of the Python's language features with the exception of some of the more inconspicuous ones. Most of the "raw" information in the book is available on python.org or other online resources, but with the book you get that same information filtered through the author's Python experience plus a lot of concise examples. I've found that what is not covered in this book is better answered by searching the related mailing list archives.
As with the other New Riders programming books I own, this one is indexed well, making it easy to find what I am looking for. Also, the size of the book is small enough that it fits nicely in my briefcase and on my desktop.
It appears that a lot of thought went into both the content of the book as well as the overall design of the reference, that's why I've given it the highest rating.
Rating:
Summary: Very helpful. Keep by your terminal while you code.
Review: This is not a book for learning python, but once you know enough to write useful scripts, it's an excellent reference to keep near your hand as you write code. Deserves the five stars! There is a tutorial introduction plus an intermediate-level description of core language features, about 100 pages long, which is useful to read for an alternate perspective into the structure of the language. The library reference section (bulk of the book, Appendix A) is well-organized and very usable. Unfortunately for the utility of this book, the online documentation at the python webpage happens to be of excellent quality. Also, there is at least one other book (Python in a Nutshell, by Alex Martelli) that covers similar ground (tutorial + reference). This makes the "Essential Reference" not quite essential: it can be replaced by browser windows pointing to the python webpage, or by other books. I have a bit of non-conventional advice: it seems to me that the casual programmer can make do with an earlier (cheaper :-) edition of the book. Most of the features of the language have been around since python 1.5.2, covered in the first edition. If you actually need to use features added later (e.g., list comprehensions, borrowed from Haskell), you can easily learn them from online sources. In any case, as far as advanced features are concerned, the latest edition is likely also to be soon outdated.
Rating: 
Summary: Good Desk Reference but I suggest you don't buy it
Review: This book is an excellent book if you already know the language and have some good Python books that explains the various language features (from Beginner to Intermediate Levels). I would recommend it if you need to quickly look up some language feature/syntax that you may have forgotten or can't quite remember. But it is not a good book for even an experienced programmer to learn Python from. The book is very terse wrt to the language features, with minimal information for somebody trying to learn about the language. The last 2/3's of the book is information on the Python libraries that come with a standard distribution. The Library section contains no more than what you will find in the documentation directory of the standard Python distribution. Considering approximately 1/3 of the book (99 pages) deals with the language and the rest deals with material that you can access and print (if required) from the current distribution that you have downloaded, it is not a particularly good book to purchase. It is a good reference book but to learn the language properly you will need to purchase other books on the subject - in which case you won't need this one! :-)
Rating: 
Summary: Valuable reference work
Review: David has done a great job condensing the need-to-known Python language material down into the first hundred pages of the book. The code examples are great, there are no graphics, and there are plenty of well-formatted tables for operators, methods, and the rest. The second half of the book is Appendix A, which covers the Python's standard library. I think it's odd that an entire section of 200+ pages is considered an appendix, but that is only a minor flaw. The reason that I give the book only four stars and not five is that Appendix A could use some more of the clever formatting applied to the first part of the book to make it more accessible. The information is all there, but it could be formatted a little better. O'Reilly does a great job with that sort of thing. Overall, this is a great handy reference for Python. Far better than the online documentation. If you are an occasional Python programmer, like me, you will find this book a great resource because you can get a quick refresher whenever you need it.
Rating: 
Summary: Not very good for anything...
Review: This is by no means a good book to do anything with. The book provides incomplete examples in the 70-something pages and then provides the rest of the book as appendices. The explanations aren't great, either... I was really disappointed with this book. Buy a better one.
Rating:
Summary: The best Python book for experienced programmers
Review: The second edition follows the exact same style as the first, and covers everything up to Python 2.1. This is probably the best serious reference book for programmers since K&R's The C Programming Language. The book takes a no-nonsense approach to explaining the nuances of the language. If you are already familiar with practically any other serious OO language, you'll be able to pick up Python in a matter of hours from this. The bulk of the book is a handy reference to the very large list of python modules (libraries). This makes for good bathroom reading. :-) My only complaint about the second edition is that it was rewritten to directly incorporate the changes since v1.5 into the text. Since I already had the first edition, it would have been helpful if there were something as simple as change bars in the text itself for info specific to 2.0 and 2.1, although there is a summary of changes in an appendix. Overall, still the best Python reference out there.
Rating:
Summary: Well-Thumbed
Review: Usually I'm an O'Reilly snob, but this is the best Python book out there, including O'Reilly's "Programming Python". I used it when I was learning the language, and continue to rely on it as my primary reference. This book and the online documentation are all you'll need.
Rating:
Summary: If there was a "Python in a Nutshell", this would be it
Review: This book is exactly what a busy programmer needs to learn and use Python. It is concise, complete, and doesn't waste time on evangelism.
Rating:
Summary: No Truer Reference Have I Found
Review: A single voice amongst so many, what can I say? Python itself is such a straight-forward, easy-to-learn language already that it requires little documentation to convey its syntax and concepts. In this respect Python meets the goals of its designer and prophet. This book wastes no time in providing the reader with this syntax and the underlying concepts. If you are a programmer of worth then picking up this book and an afternoon should teach you Python. It worked for me, and if you ask my fellow programmers my worth is subject to open and heated debate. I do a lot of my programming in some C and a lot of Perl and other scripting tools. So the foundation was there. Within a short time this book had me writing classes with automated debugging and documentation. I have yet to find another Python book that does the job as effectively in as few pages. If you're looking for a code-by-the-numbers tutorial, this isn't for you, however. Check out "Learning Python" by O'Reilly for that. The "Programming Python" explains the myriad modules that are available for Python and serves more as a cookbook. (I suppose having a book entitled "Python Cookbook" would generate misconceptions as to the content.)
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