I learned a few algorithms for generative art, you can too: nedbatchelder.com/blog/202509/...

People should spend less time learning DSA, more time learning testing. nedbatchelder.com/blog/202509/...

Vote Forward is running letter-writing campaigns to US voters. votefwd.org Does it help? Not sure. Doom-scrolling doesn't!

My wife's latest for Psychology Today. That's me in the pic, about 22 years ago.. www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/all-...

Thanks to an amazing contribution by Alex Gaynor, `coverage combine` is now twice as fast! Not released yet, but give it a try and report back. python3 -m pip install git+https://github.com/nedbat/coveragepy

Love it! And stacking parametrize for combinations is cool, too!

The pytest.mark.parametrize feature is amazing, and more people should use it, especially people new to writing #Python tests. But it looks scary. I wrote an explainer: nedbatchelder.com/blog/202508/...

I fixed a handful of issues with the new `patch = subprocess` feature in coverage․py. Try 7.10.3 and let me know how it goes! coverage.readthedocs.io/en/7.10.3/ch...

Every puzzle contains another puzzle: how was it constructed? The game Flow Free asks you to find the paths to connect same-colored dots on a grid. How are these layouts created?

You are a treasure, and I hope you have someone who treasures you.

"Coverage is one of those tools that's just silently awesome." news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4472...

Did you know you can write your own regexes to exclude code from coverage.py measurement? nedbatchelder.com/blog/202507/...

A few more words about the new `patch` option in coverage․py 7.10: "The latest release of Coverage feels like a Christmas present!" nedbatchelder.com/blog/202507/...

@nedbat.com The latest release of Coverage feels like a Christmas present! The native support for Python subprocesses is so good! Thank you for all of it 🙏🏻

In #Python, why is `reversed(range(...))` different than `range(...)`? nedbatchelder.com/blog/202507/...

What's the best way these days to get nightly builds of #Python versions? I have deadsnakes in the coverage․py nightly action, but some of the builds are over two weeks old and I don't know why. Would pyenv be better? uv? Anyone have an example working well for me to copy^H^H^H^H be inspired by?

For Open Path № 2, I talked to @simonwillison.net, @nedbat.com, and five other maintainers to understand the Open Source burnout crisis from their point of view. The dream? Financial support w/o hoops! Full episode: www.youtube.com/watch?v=VTY-...

Are you in Boston and want to hang with #Python people? Boston Python's project & collaboration night is June 24th. It's an informal gathering to talk together, work together, learn from each other, network, whatever. Tell your friends :) www.meetup.com/bostonpython...

Two geometric facts about 63, but how to connect them? nedbatchelder.com/blog/202506/...

Cog 3.5! --check now has --diff to see what changed shorter checksum format to be less distracting current directory restoration to simplify your code and, shocker! --help works! cog.readthedocs.io

39 years ago today.... nedbatchelder.com/blog/202506/...

Every June I dig this up: hachyderm.io/@nedbat/1105...

a friend of mine shared this ai-generated "emotion wheel" and unfortunately i have been laughing my ass off at it for like 15 minutes now. today i am feeling Fnliinneon

Good news: the site is back, though I still have questions about what happened...

Well, I *used* to have a web site! Digital Ocean "upgraded" my server three days ago, and nedbatchelder.com hasn't worked since. They say they are working on it...

Hmm, in CI, the "tests" action works, but the "coverage" action fails, and nothing has changed. Debugging it, I'm going to learn something. >> I learn something new every day, no matter how hard I try.

Intriguing: css-doodle.com

There's an odd resonance when your project's issue numbers start being years that you've lived through: github.com/nedbat/cover...

As a tool author, it's hard to keep up with all the changes to keep my code up-to-date. Sometimes a polite reminder is all it takes: github.com/nedbat/cover... Also, Claude made the code changes, and did a good job!

How desperate is my current "machete mode" debugging? I put "except: pass" on one line instead of two! nedbatchelder.com/text/machete...

Want more play at #PyConUS? Join us at the juggling open-space at 3:45 Saturday outside the 3rd floor rooms. It's not sky-diving, but it's still great! We'll teach you!

My suggestion related to this morning's #PyConUS diversity panel: A simple way to help with inclusion is to sit at lunch with someone who doesn't seem like you, and introduce yourself. It's easy, it's free, and those small connections grow and welcome people in.

💯 this. I also describe PyCon as "like summer camp". Something that also fits into this analogy is the post-camp blues. Coming down off the excitement of PyCon summer camp can feel mildly depressing the week after. @kojoidrissa.bsky.social has written about this: kojoidrissa.com/conferences/...

Headed to #PyConUS, thinking about how to approach the excitement. nedbatchelder.com/blog/202505/...

You may prefer the analysis from @redmonk.com redmonk.com/sogrady/2024... Looking forward to the next one being published.

The TIOBE index is crude, but it's exciting to see #Python continuing to shine: www.tiobe.com/tiobe-index/ Too bad about the simplistic and misleading summary: "[Python] is interpreted and thus prone to unexpected run-time errors."

Anyone going to #PyConUS and can bring some juggling props? I'll bring some, not sure about clubs.

You can tell TOML is a backronym because the O definitely doesn't stand for Obvious: toml.io/en/v1.0.0#ar...

In which our hero fine-tunes when GitHub actions are run, and battles mysterious YAML and GitHub oddities along the way: nedbatchelder.com/blog/202505/...

A downside of uv (or any other tool) doing so many different things: it's hard to search for "getting started with uv" because you find people using it for a different task than you wanted it for.

Another kind of bug revealed by including tests in your coverage: with pytest.raises(ValueError): process_data("bad data 1") process_data("bad data 2") # never executed! nedbatchelder.com/blog/202008/...

If an error in your #Python program seems impossible, double-check that you haven't edited the source after starting the program. Tracebacks re-read the source files to show the lines of code, so they can show you edited lines that aren't what you are running.

Sad to see an AI suggest these entries for a [tool.coverage.run] section: omit = tests/*, */__init__.py, */__main__.py, */cli.py, */setup.py, */__pycache__/*, */test_*.py nedbatchelder.com/blog/202008/...

Q: What's the plural of regex? A: regex{2,}

I'm proud of Boston! Resistance with flair: silencedogoodboston.com

Some little-used #Python regular expression features that *aren't* confusing punctuation! nedbatchelder.com/blog/202504/...

Among the many oddities in YAML is the variety of string formatting options. Here's a site that explains them: yaml-multiline.info

A parenting story from 30 years ago. Connecting with a six-year-old doesn't go as planned. nedbatchelder.com/blog/202504/...

Want a concise daily digest of issue and pull request activity from your GitHub repos? Try Dinghy: pypi.org/project/ding...

Sorting strings in #Python the way people expect: nedbatchelder.com/blog/202503/...