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#29: Responsive Bar Charts with Bokeh, Flask, and Python 3

Published Thu, Jun 8, 2017, recorded Tue, Jun 6, 2017

Python Bytes 29

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Brian #1: Responsive Bar Charts with Bokeh, Flask and Python 3

  • by Matt Makai at fullstackpython.com
  • A walkthrough example of putting together a flask app that uses Bokeh bar charts to visualize data.
  • All steps included, no previous experience with Flask or Bokeh required.
  • Nice explanation of what the code does without going into too much detail.
  • Good jumping off point for further learning, but complete enough to be useful right away.

Michael #2: Zappa Serverless Python Web Services

  • Zappa makes it super easy to build and deploy all Python WSGI applications on AWS Lambda + API Gateway
  • Think of it as "serverless" web hosting for your Python apps.
  • That means infinite scaling, zero downtime, zero maintenance - and at a fraction of the cost of your current deployments!
  • Better still, with Zappa you only pay for the milliseconds of server time that you use, so it's many orders of magnitude cheaper than VPS/PaaS hosts and in most cases, it's completely free. Plus, there's no need to worry about load balancing or keeping servers online ever again.
  • Asynchronous Task Execution:
        from flask import Flask
        from zappa.async import task
        app = Flask(__name__)
    
        @task
        def make_pie():
            """ This takes a long time! """
            ingredients = get_ingredients()
            pie = bake(ingredients)
            deliver(pie)
    
        @app.route('/api/order/pie')
        def order_pie():
            """ This returns immediately! """
            make_pie()
            return "Your pie is being made!"
    

Brian #3: Using a local cache for pip packages

  • In https://pythonbytes.fm/24, Local package store, we talked about using pip to cache pypi projects to allow offline installation:
    • $ pip download --cachedir [HTML_REMOVED]
    • $ pip install --no-index --find-links=/tmp/wheelhouse somePackage
  • Well, Dominic does us one better by wrapping these commands in a couple of aliases.
  • However, his version uses pip install --``download, which has been deprecated. Here’s a version with the new syntax:
    • alias pipcache='pip download --cache-dir ${HOME}/.pip-packages'
    • alias pipinstall='pip install --no-index --find-links=file://${HOME}/.pip-packages/'

Michael #4: Building game AI using ML: Working with TensorFlow, Keras, and the Intel MKL in Python

  • From the ActivePython guys
  • a classic arcade space shooter game that features enemies powered by machine learning
  • we decided to build a Neural Network to drive the behaviour of the enemies in the game
  • For the game part of things, we’re using PyGame
  • In the training mode, the enemies fire randomly, and then each shot taken by the enemy is recorded as a hit or a miss along with its initial relative position/velocity values. Every one of these shots becomes a row in the training matrix and the network is trained in “realtime” after every row is added so you can see the network build and develop as you train.
  • LESSONS LEARNED
    • Choosing the right data to train your network is important.
    • “Prepping” your data is key.
    • Experiment with network topology.
    • Visualization is important.

Brian #5: Debug Test Failures With Pdb

  • by Raphael Pierzina
  • Debugging code with pytest, using:
    • --pdb to jump into the debugger at the point of failure
    • -x to stop after first failure
    • --lf to re-run all the tests that failed last time
  • Note: Yes. All this and more is covered in Python Testing with pytest.
    • Shameless plug for my book. Raphael is one of the technical reviewers.
    • Thank you, Raphael!

Michael #6: Monitoring my VOIP provider with Home Assistant

  • Integrating it into Home Assistant: Use home-assistant.io as a home automation platform in my house.
  • It’s written in Python, open source, and has a large community surrounding it.
  • Unfortunately, there wasn’t anything already built for my Cisco ATA.
  • Decided to write, an open source my first python module called pyciscsospa you can download it and use it for your own ATA as well.
  • Receive a push notification on my phone when the phone lines go down and come back up

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