Dive Into Python - http://www.diveintopython.net/ Some of the examples are a bit dated now, and this type of immersive learning at intermediate/advanced levels is increasingly common (e.g. the Head First series, Codecademy, etc) but when this book came out it was rare to have this learning method presented for anything other than the most beginning levels of a language.
FROM THE HN SHELF
Dive Into Python
Mark Pilgrim
Computing · A BOOKTypographic jacket · original cover not fetched
FROM THE SHARED SHELF · 2006–2026 SAMPLE
Dive Into Python
6 readers recommend it across 2 discussions
Topics are model-inferred labels.
Keep it on your reading list
THE WORD OF MOUTH
What made it worth passing on?
Original Hacker News comments, in the readers’ own words.
If you're posting here, presumably you know how to program already. In that case working through the free "Dive into Python" PDF really is the first step you should take. After the first seven chapters you should then be able to make do with the online docs (the remaining chapters cover specialized material like HTML parsing, SOAP calls and test based development which are, in my opinion, not the first thing you should be worried about when learning a new language). "Learning Python" and especially "How to think like a computer scientist" are targeted towards people with very little programming experience. If that's you, my vote goes to "How to think like a computer scientist" (ymmv).
Also recommended in this reply
I read about half of Dive Into Python, and it was pretty advanced stuff. It's good if you know another programming language very well. The book starts out slow, but the difficulty curve accelerates very fast. I wouldn't read it cover to cover. It would be a good reference to have though. I'd suggest skimming the table of contents of both books first. Then again, Dive Into Python is free, so you might as well start with that, and if it's too advanced, switch to Learning Python (I read the first 100 pages of it last summer, and I thought it was good, I'm a fan of O'Reilly). If you really want a beginner book, Learning Python is a great choice. It was just updated too. Good luck.
Also recommended in this reply
Dive into Python by far, for me at least!
Dive into Python is great. I started learning Python from a Mark Lutz seminar actually. He is a great teacher. You'll find a limit to your knowledge of python if you just start hacking. Knowing C and how python is built help build an intuition for how things really work. I find it invaluable.
Why not read Dive into Python -- it's excellent -- and then learn about the new stuff in 2.5 later. The new stuff gives minor efficiency improvements, but Dive into Python is plenty good. http://docs.python.org/whatsnew/whatsnew25.html