This attractive and moderately-sized volume gets elementary through high school education in programming computers right, and makes the best use of the universally available (and free) “batteries-included” language–Python. In the early days of personal computers (about 1978), everyone and his brother had a Teach Yourself Basic on the TRS-80 or Apple-II programming book that got you and your kids up to speed in the Dartmouth-developed (Digital Equipment Corporation-improved) BASIC computer programming language.
At that time, you were lucky if at the conclusion of the book you could produce a simple-minded character-based Tic-Tac-Toe game (or self-prompted lessons in the multiplication tables). With excellent pedagogy and the libraries (like PYGAME) now available for the modern Python programming language this book enables the home-schooled student (or timid grandparent) to build sophisticated simulations and graphical entertainment (like a virtual pet) at least equivalent to the commercial games available in that era.
Due to the excellent tools and step-by-step examples given by Warren and Carter Sande the young reader, or his/her parent, is well prepared for a modern college level course in Data Structures or Algorithms with well illustrated examples of Lists, Modules, Event-driven and Object-Oriented Programming. The use of GUI-builders and programming libraries enable the novice to achieve impressive results within the course of a few short months of self-instruction.
The book is well illustrated, and the examples and tools downloadable from the book’s web site run correctly without the need to fix typo’s.
The only real down side is the support for Mac. The book uses Python which works on Mac, Windows and Linux but a couple of the components used in the book do not have good instructions for the Mac on the books website. For example, they are written for older Mac OS or require you to dig deep in the system files to find the directories where things belong. The forums on the website will help but expect to need to dig around a bit, especially if you use Mac OS 10.5 (Leopard), until the author(s) fix the main Mac instructions.
All in all, the book is an excellent read for a 12-year old, or an adult novice, and will provide superb instruction and entertainment for its readers. The depth and pace of the material is appropriate for anyone, starting from scratch, who wants to learn to program from lots of examples. Actually, it sets the stage nicely for someone who is anxious about needing to learn programming at the university level.
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