Python is often viewed as a beginner-friendly language with its simple syntax, ease of use, a huge standard library, and even bigger third-party library of packages to choose from! However the wealth of options available can be overwhelming to beginners, so we’ve gathered ten of our favorite GitHub Python packages to help new Python users understand which packages and libraries they should learn first.
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1) Tqdm
Ever wanted to have a visual representation of your loops progress? tqdm is a third-party package made for you! Just wrap any iterable with tqdm(iterable) and a smart progress meter will display.
2) Click
Click is a third-party package that aims to make writing command-line tools a pain-free and fast process. With arbitrary nesting of commands, automatic help page generation & support for lazy loading of subcommands at runtime, Click is our favorite “Command Line Interface Creation Kit”.
3) Pytest
Pytest is a third-party framework that lets its users write simple, scalable test cases for databases, APIs, UIs and more. With features such as detailed failure reports, auto-discovery of test modules and functions, and ease of implementation and use, Pytest is a must-have tool for any Python developer.
4) Rich
If you’re a serial note-taker, with multiple colored pens at-the-ready, then writing code in the basic terminal can seem a little lifeless and confusing. Thankfully, the Rich API allows you to add color to terminal outputs as well as being able to render tables, progress bars, markdown and more straight out of the box. Make your programming life a little more colorful and give it a try!
5) Sphinx
One of the attributes that defines great developers is keeping up-to-date and clear documentation on their Python (and other!) projects. Sphinx is made to help you create and maintain great-looking documentation with many great out-of-the-box features such as automatic indices and flexible HTML output, this is definitely a project you shouldn’t skip on!
6) Hug
Besides having a cute name and icon, hug is meant to simplify developing Python APIs with a micro-framework approach, containing as little code and integrations as possible in order to maximize performance. Hug’s website summarizes it best “Obvious. Clean. Radically simple.” APIs, and that is exactly what it accomplishes.
7) Black
Want to code without worrying about the minute details? Black is the “uncompromising” Python code formatter, helping you adhere to pycodestyle guidelines and helping you keep the style consistent across projects.
8) Nox
Nox is a super simple command-line tool that makes testing in multiple Python environments a breeze by automating them. Unlike its counterpart, “tox”, nox uses a standard Python file for configuration. Try it out here !
9) Numpy
NumPy is the package you need if you have any interest in scientific computing in Python. Providing its users with multidimensional array objects, various derived objects (such as masked arrays and matrices), an assortment of routines for fast operations on arrays, and much more. NumPy is an absolute must-have. Check out our Numpy resources here!
10 ) FastAPI
We like FastAPI so much that it made our top 10 list of Python frameworks for web development! A modern, fast API (no pun intended) for Python 3.6, this framework was made to be easy to use while helping you complete your projects with as little headache as possible.
With GitHub being the home for almost all open source language packages, it can be hard to choose which ones are worth exploring, especially for beginners. Our list should provide a great starting point for Python developers looking to make simple improvements to frameworks built for speed and for ease of use.
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