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Comment by sayhar | Hacker News Reader

A little unrelated, but this brings up a question I've had for a while.

Seems like one day, everyone around me was using dataclasses. I had not even heard of them. It felt like I had missed some memo or newsletter. It felt weird.

Here's my question: what should I have been reading / where should I have been "hanging out" online, so that I would have known that dataclasses were a thing? What are your go-tos for news about new language features, libraries that everyone is using, etc?

Hacker news is great, but it doesn't quite fill that need for me, it seems.

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For Python, you pretty much just need to be aware of when the new major version is released because the "what's new" pages are pretty good. Here's the one in which data classes were released: https://docs.python.org/3/whatsnew/3.7.html

Concretely, I found out about dataclasses by using [pydantic](https://pydantic-docs.helpmanual.io/) and seeing their drop-in `@dataclass` annotation - it got me curious about the adjacent stdlib class. I was using pydantic because I started using FastAPI to build a REST interface, which has pydantic deeply integrated.

Generally, I find out about new features through PEP posts, and I reach those by seeing a keyword that I don't know in random code I read online

I follow the language specific sub-reddits, and I read release notes for major releases of languages (so for python that would be 3.X) even if I wasn't going to jump to the version set.

> I read release notes for major releases of languages

_This_, so much.

If you are a heavy user of a language / library, it's immensely helpful to look at the release notes every once in a while. Even if you don't plan to upgrade now, it gives you an idea of where things are going (and may eventually tip the scales to a "fuck it, it's now worth upgrading" moment).

For Python specifically, PEPs are also a good way to keep track of what's happening (even if some of them don't get accepted): https://www.python.org/dev/peps/ ; there's also an RSS feed: view-source:https://www.python.org/dev/peps/peps.rss/

I found out about data classes on hn, before they were in the standard library. I also regularly search for python to see what stories I missed.

I also like to keep up to date with the PyCon videos, as well as some of the other python conferences. But, as others have said, the release notes are the main source for whats new, if a bit dry.

That said, I never actually use data classes. I normally just use dicts, and occasionally named tuples.

FWIW, here is a PyCon video to get you up to speed on dataclasses:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T-TwcmT6Rcw

A couple good newsletters are Python Weekly and PyCoder's Weekly. They each put out a mix of news, articles/tutorials, and interesting projects.

https://www.pythonweekly.com/ https://pycoders.com/

I read the release notes. I often see posts for releases here on HN or on reddit, but often I will check in on the official repos or websites to see whats new.

I like to spend a few hours a week reading up on whats happening, or try something new to keep up. Checking out new language features is part of that processes to me.

Python-centric forums, like r/Python:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Python/

I think the RealPython site is excellent for learning, even for mid to advanced users:

https://realpython.com/

They also have a great podcast:

https://realpython.com/podcasts/rpp/

Also just browsing the Python docs and release notes.

r/Python is 90% newbies showing off toy projects. It's not great for news.

Already duplicated in my reply to icegreentea2 below, but release notes for projects you use are a great place to get updates.

For Python specifically, PEPs are very helpful too: https://www.python.org/dev/peps/

In the past, Freenode #python, now Libera #python. Also the Python Discord server.

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