Best way to learn advanced Python?

There is two different things here, “advanced” Python that applies to webdev, and other areas of Python (data science, ML). Three things I would recommend:

1. As a Django dev dig deep into Django’s internals, there is loads to learn from its codebase, particularly meta classes in the orm and form frameworks. The template engine is also highly complex. Try building a tool that scratches your own itch with Django, and integrate it deeply using some of the techniques Django uses. Read lots of its code, work out how it works.

2. I think a good project to explore other areas of Python would be a web scraping then data processing project. Find something that interest you, build a scraper that extracts LOADS of data from the web or a specific site about it. Then analyse that data using NumPy and Pandas. It will teach you a bunch of new tools.

3. If you are interested in ML there a loads of interesting academic projects that have released their code on GitHub. Find one that, again, interests you (image processing, text generation, computer vision), download it, get it running, and then modify it to do something else. Or package it as a web app or something. You will learn loads about how these tools work.

I want to second all the opinions about fluent python, serious python and practices of python pro. I probably own most python books out there, and if I had to recommend one, it would by fluent python 2nd. The 2nd edition has a lot of type checking stuff that's really cool.

Two more resources that I really like:

1. Pycon videos - they're posted free on youtube. It's a great way to explore interesting problems with interesting people.

2. Another book on python by Harry Percival (he does a lot of TDD stuff) - Architecture Patterns with Python. This book is relatively new. It targets an rather niche audience (web devs). But it's hard-won knowledge and really well written. It's a wonderful resource for python devs, and a book I wish more people knew about. https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/architecture-patterns-w...

In addition to reading about Django, since that's what you use, I'd suggest finding a small bug to fix in the core project or a still-developing project in the ecosystem. It's a pretty mature project, so there's not a ton of low hanging fruit, but with new releases (like 4.1 that just dropped), there's always a few weird edge cases to fix.

Claim the issue and ask for some help (after doing your homework), and I suspect you'll get helpful direction. That was my experience anyways.

It will likely take some time to find something that looks interesting and solvable, but that's the best way to learn IMO so it's worth the grunt work.

I'm going to echo what someone else mentioned and suggest diving into the Django source. I think it's a really well done, well organized code base. They are always in need of contributors for various issues, maybe you could investigate a bug or two. Anyway, this is what was recommended to me when I wanted to "level up" my Python experience, and I think I learned a lot by doing it.

If you're interested in web dev take a look at FastAPI. In many respects it's a better Flask and leverages schemas for your requests and responses (Pydantic models), async processing and dependency injection. I wouldn't call it advanced but it incorporates features of what some refer to as "modern" Python. As someone who's been using Python for coming up 20 years I learned a lot.

Here are some often recommended books (not specific to a particular framework):

* "Fluent Python" (https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/fluent-python-2nd/97814...) — takes you through Python’s core language features and libraries, and shows you how to make your code shorter, faster, and more readable at the same time

* "Serious Python" (https://nostarch.com/seriouspython) — deployment, scalability, testing, and more

* "Practices of the Python Pro" (https://www.manning.com/books/practices-of-the-python-pro) — learn to design professional-level, clean, easily maintainable software at scale, includes examples for software development best practices

I have this same question and also work in Django, so I think I know what OP is asking about.

Django's code leans heavily into advanced Python features like metaprogramming. To use Django, you don't need to understand it, but once you start customizing things or building on what Django provides, you need to read through Django's code to understand it. And if you don't know things like metaprogramming, you'll get lost quickly.

There's not a lot of great resources for intermediate Python developers to learn these concepts. I tried reading Fluent Python but found it difficult to follow. I then checked out Learning Python 5th Ed., which is a little dated at this point, but has some good chapters on metaprogramming at the end.

That's basically how I started to get my arms around these advanced Python features to be able to understand Django's codebase a little better.

It depends on what you are interested in? If you only know Django, then learning Flask would be a good next step. You may want to take a look at the itertools and more_itertools (https://more-itertools.readthedocs.io/en/stable/) modules if you are into writing functional Python code. Also see https://docs.python.org/3/howto/functional.html

Literature if you want to get better at using the language and gain a deeper understanding of it: "Effective Python" and "Serious Python". Also have a look at the Python standard library documentation and e.g. the data model documentation, plus the release notes of recent Python versions (e.g. pattern matching). Tons of interesting material there.

Hands-on stuff: Write command-line tools and libraries that are useful for yourself or that are somehow fun. Try out some existing or 3rd party libraries.

The best way to improve is by writing more code in python. You can develop a desktop gui app or an open source python package to challenge your python skills.

I know very little about Python, but I would suggest these talks about a few ways in which Python is unique. They won't teach you Python, but they might help in making sense of the confusing bits you might encounter:

How Python was Shaped by leaky Internals, Armin Ronacher: https://youtu.be/qCGofLIzX6g

What Does It Take To Be An Expert At Python?: https://youtu.be/7lmCu8wz8ro

and maybe also

When Python Practices Go Wrong: https://youtu.be/ZdVgwhHXMpE

What do you want to achieve by learning advanced Python?

What does advanced Python mean to you?

Answers will dictate what makes sense for you. Since you said you're a Django dev, maybe try re-implementing a library/dependency you use. Start with something obvious, and then maybe something less so.

You'll learn quickly how much of it is advanced Python vs advanced Django. Python is very deep, but you don't really need to know most of it. And the ones who do, know it because they were trying to accomplish something specific.[1]

[1] Tweet about slots by author of Flask - https://mobile.twitter.com/mitsuhiko/status/5004329133817487...

There is a great youtube channel called mCoding that covers some of the more obscure details of the python language. https://youtube.com/c/mCodingWithJamesMurphy

https://codecrafters.io/

I’ve been profiting from going through P Norvig’s solutions to Advent of Code problems.