The essential blueprints and workflow you need to build successful AI business applications Key Features *Learn and master the essential blueprints to program AI for real-world business applications *Gain insights into how modern AI and machine learning solve core business challenges *Acquire practical techniques and a workflow that can build AI applications using state-of-the-art software libraries *Work with a practical, code-based strategy for creating successful AI solutions in your business Book Description AI Blueprints gives you a working framework and the techniques to build your own successful AI business applications. You’ll learn across six business scenarios how AI can solve critical challenges with state-of-the-art AI software libraries and a well thought out workflow. Along the way you’ll discover the practical techniques to build AI business applications from first design to full coding and deployment. The AI blueprints in this book solve key business scenarios. The first blueprint uses AI to find solutions for building plans for cloud computing that are on-time and under budget. The second blueprint involves an AI system that continuously monitors social media to gauge public feeling about a topic of interest - such as self-driving cars. You’ll learn how to approach AI business problems and apply blueprints that can ensure success. The next AI scenario shows you how to approach the problem of creating a recommendation engine and monitoring how those recommendations perform. The fourth blueprint shows you how to use deep learning to find your business logo in social media photos and assess how people interact with your products. Learn the practical techniques involved and how to apply these blueprints intelligently. The fifth blueprint is about how to best design a ‘trending now’ section on your website, much like the one we know from Twitter. The sixth blueprint shows how to create helpful chatbots so that an AI system can understand customers’ questions and answer them with relevant responses. This book continuously demonstrates a working framework and strategy for building AI business applications. Along the way, you’ll also learn how to prepare for future advances in AI. You’ll gain a workflow and a toolbox of patterns and techniques so that you can create your own smart code. What you will learn *An essential toolbox of blueprints and advanced techniques for building AI business applications *How to design and deploy AI applications that meet today’s business needs *A workflow from first design stages to practical code solutions in your next AI projects *Solutions for AI projects that involve social media analytics and recommendation engines *Practical projects and techniques for sentiment analysis and helpful chatbots *A blueprint for AI projects that recommend products based on customer purchasing habits *How to prepare yourself for the next decade of AI and machine learning advancements Who this book is for Programming AI Business Applications provides an introduction to AI with real-world examples. This book can be read and understood by programmers and students without requiring previous AI experience. The projects in this book make use of Java and Python and several popular and state-of-the-art opensource AI libraries.

This is a practical certification guide covering all the exam topics in an easy-to-follow manner backed with self-assessment scenarios for better preparation. Key Features *A step-by-step guide to give you a clear understanding of the Network+ Certification *Learn about network architecture, protocols, security, and network troubleshooting *Confidently ace the N10-007 exam with the help of practice tests Book Description CompTIA certified professionals have always had the upper hand in the information technology industry. This book will be your ideal guide to efficiently passing and achieving this certification. Learn from industry experts and implement their practices to resolve complex IT issues. This book revolves around networking concepts where readers will learn topics like network architecture, security, network monitoring, and troubleshooting. This book will not only prepare the readers conceptually but will also help them pass the N10-007 exam. This guide will also provide practice exercise after every chapter where readers can ensure their concepts are clear. By the end of this book, readers will leverage this guide and the included practice questions to boost their confidence in appearing for the actual certificate. What you will learn *Explain the purpose of a variety of networking concepts and implement them appropriately *Understand physical security and common attacks while securing wired and wireless networks *Understand the fundamentals of IPv4 and IPv6 *Determine and explain the appropriate cabling, device, and storage technologies *Understand network troubleshooting methodology and appropriate tools to support connectivity and performance *Use best practices to manage the network, determine policies, and ensure business continuity Who this book is for This book is ideal for readers wanting to pass the CompTIA Network+ certificate. Rookie network engineers and system administrators interested in enhancing their networking skills would also benefit from this book. No Prior knowledge on networking would be needed.

Cut through the noise and get real results with a step-by-step approach to learning Ruby programming. Key Features * Ideal for the Ruby beginner who is getting started with Ruby for the first time * A complete Ruby tutorial with exercises and activities that help build key skills * Structured to let you progress at your own pace, on your own terms * Use your physical copy to redeem free access to the online interactive edition Book Description You already know you want to learn Ruby, and the smarter way to learn Ruby 2.X is to learn by doing. The Ruby Workshop focuses on building up your practical skills so that you can kick-start your career as a developer and rapidly prototype applications. You'll learn from real examples that lead to real results. Throughout The Ruby Workshop, you'll take an engaging step-by-step approach to understanding the Ruby language. You won't have to sit through any unnecessary theory. If you're short on time you can jump into a single exercise each day or spend an entire weekend learning about metaprogramming. It's your choice. Learning on your terms, you'll build up and reinforce key skills in a way that feels rewarding. Every physical copy of The Ruby Workshop unlocks access to the interactive edition. With videos detailing all exercises and activities, you'll always have a guided solution. You can also benchmark yourself against assessments, track progress, and receive content updates. You'll even earn a secure credential that you can share and verify online upon completion. It's a premium learning experience that's included with your printed copy. To redeem, follow the instructions located at the start of your Ruby book. Fast-paced and direct, The Ruby Workshop is the ideal companion for Ruby beginners. You'll build and iterate on your Ruby code like a software developer, learning along the way. This process means that you'll find that your new skills stick, embedded as best practice. A solid foundation for the years ahead. What you will learn * Get to grips with the fundamentals of Ruby object-oriented programming * Understand common Ruby patterns to help minimize and easily maintain code * Explore ways to fetch, process, and output external data * Discover ways to work with public APIs and create reusable RubyGems * Keep your development process bug-free with various testing methods * Explore how to host applications on cloud application platforms like Heroku Who this book is for Our goal at Packt is to help you be successful, in whatever it is you choose to do. The Ruby Workshop is an ideal Ruby tutorial for the Ruby beginner who is just getting started. Pick up a Workshop today, and let Packt help you develop skills that stick with you for life.

Get proficient in building beautiful and appealing mobile interfaces (UI) with this complete mobile user experience (UX) design guide. About This Book ? Quickly explore innovative design solutions based on the real needs of your users. ? Create low and high fidelity prototypes using some of the best tools. ? Master a pragmatic design process to create successful products. ? Plan an app design from scratch to final test, with real users. Who This Book Is For This book is for designers, developers and product managers interested in creating successful apps. Readers will be provided with a process to produce, test and improve designs based on best practices. What You Will Learn ? Plan an app design from scratch to final test, with real users. ? Learn from leading companies and find working patterns. ? Apply best UX design practices to your design process. ? Create low and high fidelity prototypes using some of the best tools. ? Follow a step by step examples for Tumult Hype and Framer Studio. ? Test your designs with real users, early in the process. ? Integrate the UX Designer profile into a working team. In Detail User experience (UX) design provides techniques to analyze the real needs of your users and respond to them with products that are delightful to use. This requires you to think differently compared to traditional development processes, but also to act differently. In this book, you will be introduced to a pragmatic approach to exploring and creating mobile app solutions, reducing risks and saving time during their construction. This book will show you a working process to quickly iterate product ideas with low and high fidelity prototypes, based on professional tools from different software brands. You will be able to quickly test your ideas early in the process with the most adequate prototyping approach. You will understand the pros and cons of each approach, when you should use each of them, and what you can learn in each step of the testing process. You will also explore basic testing approaches and some more advanced techniques to connect and learn from your users. Each chapter will focus on one of the general steps needed to design a successful product according to the organization goals and the user needs. To achieve this, the book will provide detailed hands-on pragmatic techniques to design innovative and easy to use products. You will learn how to test your ideas in the early steps of the design process, picking up the best ideas that truly work with your users, rethinking those that need further refinement, and discarding those that don’t work properly in tests made with real users. By the end of the book, you will learn how to start exploring and testing your design ideas, regardless the size of the design budget. Style and approach A quick and simple guide to design and test a mobile application from the UX design point of view

Expand your boundaries by creating applications empowered with real-time data using RxJs without compromising performance About This Book ? Handle an infinite stream of incoming data using RxJs without going crazy ? Explore important RxJs operators that can help you improve your code readability ? Get acquainted with the different techniques and operators used to handle data traffic, which occurs when you receive data faster than you can process Who This Book Is For If you're a web developer with some basic JavaScript programming knowledge who wants to implement the reactive programming paradigm with JavaScript, then this book is for you. What You Will Learn ? Get to know the basics of functional reactive programming using RxJs ? Process a continuous flow of data with linear memory consumption ? Filter, group, and react to changes in your system ? Discover how to deal with data traffic ? Compose operators to create new operators and use them in multiple observables to avoid code repetition ? Explore transducers and see how they can improve your code readability ? Detect and recover from errors in observables using Retry and Catch operators ? Create your own reactive application: a real-time webchat In Detail If you’re struggling to handle a large amount of data and don’t know how to improve your code readability, then reactive programming is the right solution for you. It lets you describe how your code behaves when changes happen and makes it easier to deal with real-time data. This book will teach you what reactive programming is, and how you can use it to write better applications. The book starts with the basics of reactive programming, what Reactive Extensions is, and how can you use it in JavaScript along with some reactive code using Bacon. Next, you’ll discover what an Observable and an Observer are and when to use them.You'll also find out how you can query data through operators, and how to use schedulers to react to changes. Moving on, you’ll explore the RxJs API, be introduced to the problem of data traffic (backpressure), and see how you can mitigate it. You’ll also learn about other important operators that can help improve your code readability, and you’ll see how to use transducers to compose operators. At the end of the book, you’ll get hands-on experience of using RxJs, and will create a real-time web chat using RxJs on the client and server, providing you with the complete package to master RxJs. Style and approach This easy-to-follow guide is full of hands-on examples of reactive programming. Each topic is explained and placed in context, and for the more inquisitive there are more details of the concepts used, ending with an application using the concepts learned through the book.

Understand your users, gain strategic insights, and make your product development more efficient with user experience mapping About This Book ? Detailed guidance on the major types of User Experience Maps. ? Learn to gain strategic insights and improve communication with stakeholders . ? Get an idea on creating wireflows, mental model maps, ecosystem maps and solution maps Who This Book Is For This book is for Product Manager, Service Managers and Designers who are keen on learning the user experience mapping techniques. What You Will Learn ? Create and understand all common user experience map types. ? Use lab or remote user research to create maps and understand users better. ? Design behavioral change and represent it visually. ? Create 4D user experience maps, the “ultimate UX deliverable”. ? Capture many levels of interaction in a holistic view. ? Use experience mapping in an agile team, and learn how maps help in communicating within the team and with stakeholders. ? Become more user focused and help your organisation become user-centric. In Detail Do you want to create better products and innovative solutions? User Experience Maps will help you understand users, gain strategic insights and improve communication with stakeholders. Maps can also champion user-centricity within the organisation. Two advanced mapping techniques will be revealed for the first time in print, the behavioural change map and the 4D UX map. You will also explore user story maps, task models and journey maps. You will create wireflows, mental model maps, ecosystem maps and solution maps. In this book, the author will show you how to use insights from real users to create and improve your maps and your product. The book describes each major User Experience map type in detail. Starting with simple techniques based on sticky notes moving to more complex map types. In each chapter, you will solve a real-world problem with a map. The book contains detailed, beginner level tutorials on creating maps using different software products, including Adobe Illustrator, Balsamiq Mockups, Axure RP or Microsoft Word. Even if you don’t have access to any of those, each map type can also be drawn with pen and paper. Beyond creating maps, the book will also showcase communication techniques and workshop ideas. Although the book is not intended to be a comprehensive guide to modern user experience or product management, its novel ideas can help you create better solutions. You will also learn about the Kaizen-UX management framework, developed by the author, now used by many agencies and in-house UX teams in Europe and beyond. Buying this map will give you hundreds of hours worth of user experience knowledge, from one of the world’s leading UX consultants. It will change your users’ world for the better. If you are still not convinced, we have hidden some cat drawings in it, just in case. Style and approach An easy to understand guide, filled with real world use cases on how to plan, prioritize and visualize your project on customer experience

Say goodbye to unproductive Linux habits and switch to the express lane About This Book ? Improve your terminal and command-line productivity by using powerful tools ? Sharpen your existing command-line skills and achieve complex tasks faster ? Save time and money by creating customized commands that automate day-to-day tasks Who This Book Is For This book is for system administrators and developers who know the basics of Linux and want to brush up and sharpen their skills. Prior experience with Linux shell is required. What You Will Learn ? Optimize the power of Guake by integrating it with ClipIt ? Deep dive into the workings of the console editor—Vim ? Explore the advanced concepts and best practices of shell *ing ? Edit large amounts of data quickly using Sed ? Use pipes and subshells to create customized commands ? Get to know how you can speed up the software development and make the terminal a handy companion In Detail Websites, online services, databases, and pretty much every other computer that offers public services runs on Linux. From small servers to clusters, Linux is anywhere and everywhere. With such a broad usage, the demand for Linux specialists is ever growing. For the engineers out there, this means being able to develop, interconnect, and maintain Linux environments. This book will help you increase your terminal productivity by using Terminator, Guake and other tools. It will start by installing Ubuntu and will explore tools and techniques that will help you to achieve more work with less effort. Next, it will then focus on Terminator, the ultimate terminal, and vim, one of the most intelligent console editors. Futhermore, the readers will see how they can increase their command line productivity by using sed, find, tmux, network, autoenv. The readers will also see how they can edit files without leaving the terminal and use the screen space efficiently and copy-paste like a pro. Towards the end, we focus on network settings, Git hacks, and creating portable environments for development and production using Docker. Through this book, you will improve your terminal productivity by seeing how to use different tools. Style and Approach This book takes a step-by-step approach using examples that show you how to automate tasks using terminal commands. You’ll work through easy-to-follow instructions so you learn to use the various Linux commands and tools such as Terminator, Guake, and others.

This is a stepbystep guide to design patterns, best practices, and solutions to common problems for Backbone.jsbased application development. This book is for JavaScript developers who work with Backbone.js and want to learn the best design patterns to develop complex web applications. Basic knowledge of Backbone.js and JavaScript is essential.

Performance Testing With JMeter 2.9 is a standard tutorial that will help you polish your fundamentals, guide you through various advanced topics, and along the process help you learn new tools and skills.This book is for developers, quality assurance engineers, testers, and test managers new to Apache JMeter, or those who are looking to get a good grounding in how to effectively use and become proficient with it. No prior testing experience is required.

Design, develop, and solve real world automation and orchestration needs by unlocking the automation capabilities of Ansible About This Book Discover how Ansible works in detail Explore use cases for Ansible’s advanced features including task delegation, fast failures, and serial task execution Extend Ansible with custom modules, plugins, and inventory sources Who This Book Is For This book is intended for Ansible developers and operators who have an understanding of the core elements and applications but are now looking to enhance their skills in applying automation using Ansible. What You Will Learn Understand Ansible’s code and logic flow Safeguard sensitive data within Ansible Access and manipulate complex variable data within Ansible playbooks Handle task results to manipulate change and failure definitions Organize Ansible content into a simple structure Craft a multi-tier rollout playbook utilizing load balancers and manipulating your monitoring system Utilize advanced Ansible features to orchestrate rolling updates with almost no service disruptions Troubleshoot Ansible failures to understand and resolve issues Extend Ansible with custom modules, plugins, or inventory sources In Detail Automation is critical to success in the world of DevOps. How quickly and efficiently an application deployment can be automated, or a new infrastructure can be built up, can be the difference between a successful product or a failure. Ansible provides a simple yet powerful automation engine. Beyond the basics of Ansible lie a host of advanced features which are available to help you increase efficiency and accomplish complex orchestrations with ease. This book provides you with the knowledge you need to understand how Ansible works at a fundamental level and leverage its advanced capabilities. You'll learn how to encrypt Ansible content at rest and decrypt data at runtime. You will master the advanced features and capabilities required to tackle the complex automation challenges of today and beyond. You will gain detailed knowledge of Ansible workflows, explore use cases for advanced features, craft well thought out orchestrations, troubleshoot unexpected behaviour, and extend Ansible through customizations. Finally, you will discover the methods used to examine and debug Ansible operations, helping you to understand and resolve issues. Style and approach A clear, practical guide that covers best practise, system architecture and design aspects that will help you master Ansible with ease.

This book is intended for cloud engineers or administrators who wish to explore and gain hands-on experience of VMware vCloud Air. To make the most of this book, it would be beneficial to have a bit of familiarity with basic VMware vCloud concepts, but no prior experience is required.

Measure, optimize, and improve the performance of your Python code with this easy-to-follow guide About This Book Master the do's and don'ts of Python performance programming Learn how to use exiting new tools that will help you improve your *s A step-by-step, conceptual guide to teach you how to optimize and fine-tune your critical pieces of code Who This Book Is For If you're a Python developer looking to improve the speed of your *s or simply wanting to take your skills to the next level, then this book is perfect for you. What You Will Learn Master code optimization step-by-step and learn how to use different tools Understand what a profiler is and how to read its output Interpret visual output from profiling tools and improve the performance of your * Use Cython to create fast applications using Python and C Take advantage of PyPy to improve performance of Python code Optimize number-crunching code with NumPy, Numba, Parakeet, and Pandas In Detail Simply knowing how to code is not enough; on mission-critical pieces of code, every bit of memory and every CPU cycle counts, and knowing how to squish every bit of processing power out of your code is a crucial and sought-after skill. Nowadays, Python is used for many scientific projects, and sometimes the calculations done in those projects require some serious fine-tuning. Profilers are tools designed to help you measure the performance of your code and help you during the optimization process, so knowing how to use them and read their output is very handy. This book starts from the basics and progressively moves on to more advanced topics. You’ll learn everything from profiling all the way up to writing a real-life application and applying a full set of tools designed to improve it in different ways. In the middle, you’ll stop to learn about the major profilers used in Python and about some graphic tools to help you make sense of their output. You’ll then move from generic optimization techniques onto Python-specific ones, going over the main constructs of the language that will help you improve your speed without much of a change. Finally, the book covers some number-crunching-specific libraries and how to use them properly to get the best speed out of them. After reading this book, you will know how to take any Python code, profile it, find out where the bottlenecks are, and apply different techniques to remove them. Style and approach This easy-to-follow, practical guide will help you enhance your optimization skills by improving real-world code.

Gain practical knowledge of mathematical and physics concepts in order to design and develop an awesome game world using Unreal Engine 4 About This Book Use the Physics Asset Tool within Unreal Engine 4 to develop game physics objects for your game world Explore the Collision mechanics within Unreal Engine 4 to create advanced, real-world physics A step-by-step guide to implementing the Physics concepts involved in Unreal Engine 4 to create a working Vehicle Blueprint Who This Book Is For This book is intended for beginner to intermediate users of Epic Games' Unreal Engine 4 who want to learn more about how to implement physics within their game-world. No matter what your knowledge base of Unreal Engine 4 is, this book contains valuable information on blueprint *ing, collision generation, materials, and the Physical Asset Tool (PhAT) for all users to create better games. What You Will Learn Get to know basic to intermediate topics in mathematics and physics Create assets using the Physics Asset Tool (PhAT) in Unreal Engine 4 Develop Collision Hulls, which are necessary to take advantage of Unreal Engine 4’s physics and collision events Use constraints to create advanced physics-based assets for your game-world Working knowledge of physics bodies, physics damping, and friction within Unreal Engine 4 Develop physical materials to recreate real-world friction for substances such as glass and ice Create a working vehicle blueprint from scratch using assets provided by Unreal Engine 4 Gain knowledge about implementing advanced physics in Unreal Engine 4 using C++ programming In Detail Unreal Engine 4 is one of the leading game development tools used by both AAA and independent developers alike to create breathe-taking games. One of the key features of this tool is the use of Physics to create a believable game-world for players to explore. This book gives readers practical insight into the mathematical and physics principles necessary to properly implement physics within Unreal Engine 4. Discover how to manipulate physics within Unreal Engine 4 by learning basic real-world mathematical and physics concepts that assist in the implementation of physics-based objects in your game world. Then, you'll be introduced to PhAT (Physics Asset Tool) within Unreal Engine 4 to learn more about developing game physics objects for your game world. Next, dive into Unreal Engine 4’s collision generation, physical materials, blueprints, constraints, and more to get hands-on experience with the tools provided by Epic to create real-world physics in Unreal Engine 4. Lastly, you will create a working Vehicle Blueprint that uses all the concepts covered in this book, as well as covering advanced physics-based topics. Style and approach An easy-to-follow reference text filled with working examples of physics within Unreal Engine 4. Each topic is broken down to easily explain how to implement physics and physical objects in your game-world using the tools provided by Epic Games Unreal Engine 4.

A fast-paced guide to develop, test, and deliver real-time communication in your .Net applications using SignalR About This Book Build and test real-time apps in .Net using the new features of SignalR Explore the fundamentals and the new methods and functions in the latest version of SignalR along with developing a complete application from scratch A progressive, hands-on guide to gain an understanding of the SignalR framework Who This Book Is For If you are a .Net developer with good understanding of the .Net platform then this is an ideal book for you to learn how to build real-time apps using the SignalR framework. What You Will Learn Explore the basic knowledge and understanding of SignalR Get to know how to connect client to the server Connecting a client with a server and setting a hub Creating group connections together Understand how to have state in the client to have specific operations Securing SignalR connections How to scale SignalR across multiple servers Building a client for WPF Building a client using Xamarin targeting Windows, iPhone and Android Get to grips with monitoring the traffic in SignalR using Fiddler for Windows and Charles for OSX Setting up code to host SignalR using OWIN In Detail With technology trends, demands on software have changed with more and more skilled users. Over the past few years, with services such as Facebook, Twitter and push notifications on smartphones, users are now getting used to being up to date with everything that happens all the time. With SignalR, the applications stay connected and will generate notifications when something happens either from the system or by other users thus giving new opportunities to enter into this new, exciting world of real-time application development. This is a step-by-step guide that follows a practical approach helping you as a developer getting to get started with SignalR by learning its fundamentals. It will help you through building real-time applications using the new methods and functions in the SignalR framework. Starting from getting persistent connections with the server, you will learn the basics of connecting a client to the server and how the messaging works. This will be followed by setting up a hub on the server and consuming it from a JavaScript client. Next you will be taught how you can group connections together to send messages. We will then go on to know how you can have state in the client to handle specific operations like connecting or disconnecting. Then, moving on you will learn how to secure your SignalR connections using OWIN and scaling SignalR across multiple servers. Next you will learn building a client for WPF and building a client using Xamarin that targets Windows Phone, iPhone and Android. Lastly, you will learn how to monitor the traffic in SignalR using Fiddler, Charles and hosting SignalR using OWIN. Style and approach This is an example- oriented and comprehensive guide to learning the fundamentals of SignalR to build real-time applications. It will help you build real-time applications on the .Net platform in a step-by-step manner along with giving teaching techniques to deal with possible performance bottlenecks and other key topics.

Design and build fantastic projects and devices using the Arduino platform About This Book Explore the different sensors that can be used to improve the functionality of the Arduino projects Program networking modules in conjunction with Arduino to make smarter and more communicable devices A practical guide that shows you how to utilize Arduino to create practical, useful projects Who This Book Is For This book is an ideal choice for hobbyists or professionals who want to create quick and easy projects with Arduino. As a prerequisite, readers must have a working Arduino system and some programming background, ideally in C/C++. Basic knowledge of Arduino is helpful but not required to follow along with this book. What You Will Learn Understand and utilize the capabilities of the Arduino Integrate sensors to gather environmental data and display this information in meaningful ways Add modules such as Bluetooth and Wi-fithat allow the Arduino to communicate and send data between devices Create simple servers to allow communication to occur Build automated projects including robots while learning complex algorithms to mimic biological locomotion Implement error handling to make programs easier to debug and look more professional Integrate powerful programming tools and software such as Python and Processing to broaden the scope of what the Arduino can achieve Practice and learn basic programming etiquette In Detail Arduino an opensource physical computing platform based on a simple microcontroller board, and a development environment for writing software for the board. The opensource Arduino software (IDE) makes it easy to write code and upload it to the board. It runs on Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux. The environment is written in Java and based on Processing and other opensource software. With the growing interest in home-made, weekend projects among students and hobbyists alike, Arduino offers an innovative and feasible platform to create projects that promote creativity and technological tinkering. Arduino by Example is a project-oriented guide to help you fully utilize the power of one of the world's most powerful open source platforms, Arduino. This book demonstrates three projects ranging from a home automation project involving your lighting system to a simple robotic project to a touch sensor project. You will first learn the basic concepts such as how to get started with the Arduino, and as you start building the project, you will develop the practical skills needed to successfully build Arduino powered projects that have real-life implications. The complexity of the book slowly increases as you complete a project and move on to the next. By the end of this book, you will be able to create basic projects and utilize the elements used in the examples to construct your own devices. Style and approach This book follows a project-oriented approach, with multiple images and plenty of code to help you build your projects easily. The book uses a tutorial-based methodology where the concepts are first explained and then implemented to help you develop the projects.

A pragmatic guide for developing your own games with Python About This Book Strengthen your fundamentals of game programming with Python language Seven hands-on games to create 2D and 3D games rapidly from scratch Illustrative guide to explore the different GUI libraries for building your games Who This Book Is For If you have ever wanted to create casual games in Python and you would like to explore various GUI technologies that this language offers, this is the book for you. This title is intended for beginners to Python with little or no knowledge of game development, and it covers step by step how to build seven different games, from the well-known Space Invaders to a classical 3D platformer. What You Will Learn Take advantage of Python’s clean syntax to build games quickly Discover distinct frameworks for developing graphical applications Implement non-player characters (NPCs) with autonomous and seemingly intelligent behaviors Design and code some popular games like Pong and tower defense Compose maps and levels for your sprite-based games in an easy manner Modularize and apply object-oriented principles during the design of your games Exploit libraries like Chimpunk2D, cocos2d, and Tkinter Create natural user interfaces (NUIs), using a camera and computer vision algorithms to interpret the player’s real-world actions In Detail With a growing interest in learning to program, game development is an appealing topic for getting started with coding. From geometry to basic Artificial Intelligence algorithms, there are plenty of concepts that can be applied in almost every game. Python is a widely used general-purpose, high-level programming language. It provides constructs intended to enable clear programs on both a small and large scale. It is the third most popular language whose grammatical syntax is not predominantly based on C. Python is also very easy to code and is also highly flexible, which is exactly what is required for game development. The user-friendliness of this language allows beginners to code games without too much effort or training. Python also works with very little code and in most cases uses the “use cases” approach, reserving lengthy explicit coding for outliers and exceptions, making game development an achievable feat. Python Game Programming by Example enables readers to develop cool and popular games in Python without having in-depth programming knowledge of Python. The book includes seven hands-on projects developed with several well-known Python packages, as well as a comprehensive explanation about the theory and design of each game. It will teach readers about the techniques of game design and coding of some popular games like Pong and tower defense. Thereafter, it will allow readers to add levels of complexities to make the games more fun and realistic using 3D. At the end of the book, you will have added several GUI libraries like Chimpunk2D, cocos2d, and Tkinter in your tool belt, as well as a handful of recipes and algorithms for developing games with Python. Style and approach This book is an example-based guide that will teach you to build games using Python. This book follows a step-by-step approach as it is aimed at beginners who would like to get started with basic game development. By the end of this book you will be competent game developers with good knowledge of programming in Python.

Extract and analyze data from complex images with ImageJ, the world’s leading image processing tool About This Book Design automated image-processing solutions and speed up image-processing tasks with ImageJ Create quality and intuitive interfaces for image processing by developing a basic framework for ImageJ plugins. Tackle even the most sophisticated datasets and complex images Who This Book Is For The book has been created for engineers, scientists, and developers eager to tackle image processing with one of the leading tools available. No prior knowledge of ImageJ is needed. Familiarity with Java programming will be required for readers to code their own routines using ImageJ. What You Will Learn Install and set up ImageJ for image processing. Process images using ImageJ’s built-in tools Create macros to perform repetitive processing tasks Set up and use an integrated development environment for ImageJ plugins Create plugins with a user-friendly interface for processing Use established ImageJ plugins for processing and quantification Generate a simple interface based on a real world example and create other interfaces for other projects Speed up interface development by setting multiple parameters interactively In Detail Advances in image processing have been vital for the scientific and technological communities, making it possible to analyze images in greater detail than ever before. But as images become larger and more complex, advanced processing techniques are required. ImageJ is built for the modern challenges of image processing – it’s one of the key tools in its development, letting you automate basic tasks so you can focus on sophisticated, in depth analysis. This book demonstrates how to put ImageJ into practice. It outlines its key features and demonstrates how to create your own image processing applications using macros and ImageJ plugins. Once you’ve got to grips with the basics of ImageJ, you’ll then discover how to build a number of different image processing solutions. From simple tasks to advanced and automated image processing, you’ll gain confidence with this innovative and powerful tool – however and whatever you are using it for. Style and approach A step-by-step guide to image processing and developing macros and plugins in ImageJ. The book will progress from using the built-in tools to macros and finally plugins for image processing.

This book is for you if you are a data scientist or working on any technical or scientific computation projects. The book assumes you have a basic working knowledge of high-level dynamic languages such as MATLAB, R, Python, or Ruby.

This book is meant for developers of all experience levels looking to create mobile and full-stack web applications in JavaScript. Many of the simple recipes can easily be followed by less-experienced developers, while some of the advanced recipes will require extensive knowledge of existing web, mobile, and server technologies. Any application or enterprise web developer looking to create full-stack JavaScript-based apps will benefit from the recipes and concepts covered in this book.

If you are a Java developer, student, researcher, or hobbyist wanting to create computer vision applications in Java then this book is for you. If you are an experienced C/C++ developer who is used to working with OpenCV, you will also find this book very useful for migrating your applications to Java. All you need is basic knowledge of Java, with no prior understanding of computer vision required, as this book will give you clear explanations and examples of the basics.

If you are a data analyst, developer, or simply someone who wants to use Hive to explore and analyze data in Hadoop, this is the book for you. Whether you are new to big data or an expert, with this book, you will be able to master both the basic and the advanced features of Hive. Since Hive is an SQL-like language, some previous experience with the SQL language and databases is useful to have a better understanding of this book.