Python Bytes
Python Bytes
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Python Bytes is a weekly podcast hosted by Michael Kennedy and Brian Okken. The show is a short discussion on the headlines and noteworthy news in the Python, developer, and data science space.

#312 AI Goes on Trial For Writing Code

November 29, 2022 00:35:26 38.67 MB Downloads: 0
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Brian #1: Coping strategies for the serial project hoarder

  • Simon Willison
  • Also a talk from DjangoCon2022
  • I’m actually not sure what title would be best, but this is an incredible video that I’m encouraging every developer to watch, whether or not you work with open source projects.
  • Covers
    • The perfect commit
      • Implementation, Tests, Documentation, and a link to an issue thread
    • Tests
      • Prove the implementation works, pass if it works, fails otherwise
      • A discussion of how adding tests is way easier than starting testing a project, so get the framework in place early, and devs won’t be afraid to add to it.
    • Cookiecutter repo templates for projects you will likely start
      • super cool idea to have your own that you keep up to date with your preferred best practices
    • A trick for using GitHub actions to use those templates to populate new repos
      • Trying this out is on my todo list
    • Documentation must live in the same repo as the code
      • and be included in PRs for the PR to be accepted by code review
      • maybe even test this using documentation unit tests
    • Everything links to an issue thread
      • Keep all of your thoughts in an issue thread
      • Doesn’t have to be a dialog with anyone but yourself
      • This allows you to NOT HAVE TO REMEMBER ANYTHING
    • Tell people what you did
      • This is just as important in work projects as it is in open source
      • Blog about it
      • Post on Twitter (or Mastodon, etc.)
    • Avoid side projects with user accounts
      • “If you build something that people can sign into, that’s not a side-project, it’s an unpaid job. It’s a very big responsibility, avoid at all costs!” - this is hilarious and something I’m probably not going to follow

Michael #2: GitHub copilot lawsuit

  • First, we aren’t lawyers
  • Lawsuit filed on November 3, 2022
  • We’ve filed a lawsuit challenging GitHub Copilot, an AI product that relies on unprecedented open-source software piracy.
  • GitHub copilot is trained on projects on GitHub, including GPL and other restrictive licenses
  • This is the first class-action case in the US challenging the training and output of AI systems.

Brian #3: Use Windows Dialog Boxes from Python with no extra libraries

  • Actual title: Display a message box with Python without using a non-standard library or other dependency (Windows)
  • By Matt Callahan / learned about from from PyCoders weekly
  • When I need a simple pop up dialog box that’s cross platform, PySimpleGUI is awesome and so easy.
  • But when I KNOW it’s only going to run on Windows, why not just use native dialog boxes?
  • Matt’s article shows you how, using ctypes to call into a Windows dll.

  • Small example from article:

    import ctypes

    def main():
        WS_EX_TOPMOST = 0x40000
        windowTitle = "Python Windows Message Box Test"
        message = "Hello, world!"
        # display a message box; execution will stop here until user acknowledges
        ctypes.windll.user32.MessageBoxExW(None, message, windowTitle, WS_EX_TOPMOST)
        print("User clicked OK.")

    if __name__ == "__main__":
        main()

  • Notes:

    • The uType (fourth) parameter is a multi-use value that can be or-ed for things like:
      • Type of dialog box: Help, OK, OK/Cancel, Retry/Cancel, Yes/No, etc.
      • The icon to use: Exclamation, Info, Question, etc.
      • Modality, …
    • Return value is used to understand how user reacted:
      • 1 - OK, 2 - Cancel (or x), …, 6 - Yes, 7 - No, …

Michael #4: Extra Extra Extra