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The Dispatch

Python 3 Bootcamp Course Development Stagnates Despite Community Interest

The Python 3 Bootcamp Course is a comprehensive educational resource covering Python basics to advanced topics, offered on Udemy. Despite its popularity, with over 84,000 forks and 27,000 stars, the project has seen minimal official development activity in recent months.

The most significant aspect of the project's current state is the lack of recent commits from the core development team. The last commit by the primary maintainer, Pierian Data, was 508 days ago, indicating a prolonged period of inactivity in terms of official updates to the course materials.

Recent Activity

While official development has slowed, the project continues to see engagement from the community:

  1. Open pull requests: There are currently 100 open pull requests, with the most recent ones focusing on updating assessment tests (#616 and #615) and course content (#612 and #611).

  2. Issues: Recent issues primarily revolve around user difficulties with accessing or editing course materials, suggesting potential areas for improvement in setup instructions or content delivery.

The development team's recent activities have been limited:

  1. Pierian Data (Pierian-Data)

    • Last activity: Updated pdffilereader 508 days ago
    • Previous activities: Merged PR #393, refactored section 09, updated README.md, added image links to notebooks, added emails, performed 2020 updates
  2. Knight-coder

    • Last activity: Updated README.md 1042 days ago
  3. Michael Brothers (TiVentures)

    • Last activity: 2343 days ago
    • Added modules content, fixed typos, added new notebooks and exercises
  4. Seth Rutner (sprutner)

    • Last activity: 2354 days ago
    • Updated 06-Tuples.ipynb for accuracy

Of Note

  1. Prolonged inactivity: The significant gap since the last official commit (508 days) raises questions about the ongoing maintenance of the course materials.

  2. Community contributions: Despite official inactivity, community members continue to submit pull requests and report issues, indicating sustained interest in the course.

  3. Unaddressed pull requests: Many pull requests remain open for extended periods, some for over 2000 days, suggesting a potential backlog in review processes.

  4. Recurring user issues: Multiple reports of difficulties with notebook access and editing indicate a need for clearer setup instructions or improved content delivery methods.

  5. Course material stability: The low volume of new issues suggests that despite the lack of recent updates, the existing course materials remain largely functional and valuable to users.

Quantified Reports

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Recent GitHub Issues Activity

Timespan Opened Closed Comments Labeled Milestones
7 Days 0 0 0 0 0
30 Days 1 1 0 1 1
90 Days 5 1 2 5 1
1 Year 27 13 18 27 1
All Time 353 223 - - -

Like all software activity quantification, these numbers are imperfect but sometimes useful. Comments, Labels, and Milestones refer to those issues opened in the timespan in question.

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Quantified Commit Activity Over 30 Days

Developer Avatar Branches PRs Commits Files Changes
None (Kasi-VS) 0 1/0/1 0 0 0
Mekila (mekiolivier) 0 1/0/0 0 0 0
None (PythonPro-lab) 0 1/0/0 0 0 0

PRs: created by that dev and opened/merged/closed-unmerged during the period

Detailed Reports

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Here is my analysis of the GitHub Issues for the Python 3 Bootcamp project:

Recent Activity Analysis

Recent GitHub issue activity has been relatively low, with only a few new issues opened in the past month. The most common themes among recent issues relate to difficulties accessing or editing course materials and notebooks.

There are some recurring issues that seem significant:

  1. Many users report being unable to edit or type code in assessment tests and exercises. This appears to be due to confusion about how to properly download and open the notebooks locally, rather than trying to edit them directly on GitHub. The maintainers have repeatedly had to remind users to watch the setup videos that explain this process.

  2. There are frequent reports of notebooks not loading or displaying properly when viewed on GitHub. Again, this seems to stem from users not understanding they need to download the materials to work with them locally.

  3. Several users have reported issues with specific coding exercises or solutions, suggesting there may be some errors or unclear instructions in certain lessons that could be improved.

  4. There are occasional requests for additional learning resources or practice problems, indicating some students desire more opportunities to apply what they've learned.

The fact that many of these issues are recurring suggests the course materials or instructions around setup and usage could potentially be clarified or improved to reduce confusion. However, the maintainers appear to be actively monitoring and responding to issues to provide guidance.

Issue Details

Most recently created issues:

  1. #613: "Python udemy" - Created 29 days ago, no details provided
  2. #610: "Function Color" - Created 54 days ago, user experiencing issues with function highlighting in their IDE
  3. #609: "62. Validating User input (Shortcut)" - Created 64 days ago, user sharing a code snippet, possibly seeking feedback

Most recently updated issues:

  1. #435: "FETCH command error: BAD [b'Could not parse command']" - Created 860 days ago, updated 4 days ago. User experiencing an error in a specific lecture, others reporting the same issue.
  2. #610: "Function Color" - As mentioned above, updated 50 days ago with a suggested solution from another user.
  3. #606: "Coding exercise of numbers simple arithmetic" - Created 90 days ago, updated 71 days ago. User unable to evaluate an expression and seeking help.

These recent issues highlight ongoing challenges with specific exercises or technical setup that some students are facing. The relatively low volume of new issues suggests the course materials are generally stable, but there may be room for improvement in certain areas to enhance the learning experience.

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Overview

The repository contains a comprehensive Python 3 bootcamp course with 100 open pull requests and 148 closed pull requests, covering a wide range of topics from basics to advanced concepts.

Summary of Pull Requests

#616: Update to assessment test (2 days ago) #615: Another update to assessment test (18 days ago) #612: Update to Files lesson (43 days ago) #611: Added new files (44 days ago) #605: Minor language correction (92 days ago) #590: Correction to homework exercise (114 days ago) #589: Added practice notebook (127 days ago) #588: Updated function practice solutions (132 days ago) #587: Updated function practice exercises (132 days ago) #584: Update to statements assessment (138 days ago)

Analysis of Pull Requests

The pull requests show ongoing maintenance and improvement of the course materials. Many recent PRs focus on updating and correcting existing content, such as assessment tests (#616, #615, #584) and practice exercises (#590, #588, #587). This suggests a commitment to keeping the course material accurate and up-to-date.

There's also evidence of content expansion, with new files being added (#611) and practice notebooks being contributed (#589). This indicates that the course is still actively growing and evolving.

Some PRs address minor issues like language corrections (#605) and typo fixes (#612). While these changes are small, they demonstrate attention to detail and a desire to maintain high-quality materials.

The repository seems to welcome contributions from various users, as seen in the diverse authorship of PRs. However, many PRs remain open for extended periods (some for over 2000 days), which could indicate a slow review process or lack of maintainer bandwidth.

There are also several PRs that appear to be from students practicing with Git (#583, #569, #558), which suggests the course may incorporate version control lessons.

One area of concern is the large number of long-standing open PRs. Many of these are minor changes or student contributions that could likely be quickly reviewed and merged or closed. A more active approach to PR management could help keep the repository cleaner and more up-to-date.

Overall, the pull request activity shows that this is an active, community-supported educational resource that is continually being refined and expanded. However, there's room for improvement in the management of contributions to ensure timely reviews and to maintain a clean, relevant set of open issues and pull requests.

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Development Team and Recent Activity

Team Members and Recent Activity

  1. Pierian Data (Pierian-Data)

    • Most recent activity: Updated pdffilereader 508 days ago
    • Previous activities:
    • Merged pull request #393 from Knight-coder (README.md update)
    • Refactored section 09
    • Updated README.md
    • Added image links to all notebooks
    • Added emails
    • Performed 2020 Updates in multiple phases
  2. Knight-coder

    • Most recent activity: Updated README.md 1042 days ago
  3. Michael Brothers (TiVentures)

    • Last active 2343 days ago
    • Added modules content
    • Fixed various typos and made minor changes
    • Added several new notebooks and exercises
  4. Seth Rutner (sprutner)

    • Last active 2354 days ago
    • Updated 06-Tuples.ipynb for accuracy

Patterns and Conclusions

  1. Limited recent activity: The most recent commit was 508 days ago, indicating a lack of recent updates to the repository.

  2. Primary contributor: Pierian Data appears to be the main maintainer, responsible for major updates and merging pull requests.

  3. Collaborative efforts: The repository shows evidence of collaboration, with contributions from multiple team members and merged pull requests.

  4. Periodic updates: The repository underwent significant updates in 2020, with multiple phases of improvements.

  5. Content focus: Recent activities primarily involved updating course materials, refactoring sections, and improving documentation.

  6. Maintenance pattern: While the repository has seen substantial work in the past, the lack of recent commits suggests it may not be actively maintained at present.

  7. Community engagement: Despite limited recent activity from the core team, the repository continues to see engagement from the community, as evidenced by open pull requests from users like PythonPro-lab, mekiolivier, and Kasi-VS.