My first python package

1 minute read

Last year I did learn a new programming language: Python. I wanted to try the JetBrains Academy (JBA) while looking for new ways to learn, and it did work. In six months of working a bit every day, I did have enough knowledge to start doing exciting things. After learning the language, I was looking at how to keep practising, and I did find the solution on a small utility to improve my website.

In JBA, two things were missing: TDD and Packaging. I do all my coding using TDD, and JBA did not cover that correctly, so I had to read a book about testing on Python. JBA does not talk about packaging and distribution in detail, so I had to read the official documentation about that. That took a while since the documentation was not that good. After some study time and practising, I was on my way to do my work.

The idea for the scrip was simple enough: a script that takes the GoodReads CSV exported package and converts its data into prepared JSON to be consumed by Jekyll, but with a twist. The tool should allow me to complement and customize the data.

Since I have plans to add more functionality to my site, I did design it to be a generic suite of tools. Powerful tools like “git” work like that.

The result is a package that I call go-over. It is available on PyPI. And you can see the result of its usage on my site. I’m thrilled with the result, and Laia already asked me to add it to her site!

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