Python News: What’s New From August 2023

In August 2023, Python 3.12.0rc1 came out! With several exciting features, improvements, and optimizations, this release is only two steps away from the final release scheduled for October. If you want to stay on the cutting edge, then you must give it a try. But note that you shouldn’t use it in production.

Another exciting release was Python in Excel, which allows you to leverage the power of Python inside your Excel workbooks. You’ll be able to use Python’s data science ecosystem while you remain in your Excel comfort zone with known formulas, charts, and more.

But that’s not all! The Python Software Foundation (PSF) announced a new roster of fellows and a safety and security engineer for PyPI. Some key package maintainers were busy with the Python DataFrame Summit 2023, and several key libraries released new versions.

Let’s dive into the most exciting Python news from August 2023!

Python 3.12.0 Release Candidate Arrives

This August, Python put out its first release candidate version, 3.12.0rc1. This version is only two steps away from the final release, 3.12.0, which is scheduled for October 2. Before that, Python will deliver another release candidate, planned for September 4.

As Python ventures into the release candidate stage, only confirmed bug fixes will be accepted into the codebase. The goal is to have as few code changes as possible. Most likely, the core team will focus on:

• Polishing and documenting all the changes
• Updating the What’s New document

As you can read in the release notes, 3.12 will have the following list of new features compared to Python 3.11:

• More flexible f-string parsing, allowing you to do more with your f-strings than you previously could (PEP 701)
• Support for the buffer protocol in Python code (PEP 688)
• A new debugging/profiling API (PEP 669)
• Support for isolated subinterpreters with separate global interpreter locks (PEP 684)
• Even more improved error messages, meaning that you get suggestions for more exceptions potentially caused by typos
• Support for the Linux perf profiler to report Python function names in traces
• Many large and small performance improvements, such as PEP 709, which deliver an estimated 5 percent overall performance improvement

If you’d like to learn more about some of these improvements, then check out Real Python’s previews of more intuitive and consistent f-strings, ever better error messages, and support for the Linux perf profiler.

As usual, this version also brings several deprecations that you may need to consider. For a detailed list of changes, additions, and removals, you can check the changelog document.

Just like other pre-release versions, Python 3.12.0rc1 is intended for experimentation and testing purposes only and isn’t recommended for use in production.

Python Makes Its Way Into Microsoft Excel

On August 22, Microsoft announced Python in Excel, a new and exciting feature that combines the flexibility of Excel and the power of Python. This combination may have a considerable impact on the data science industry.

This is a huge announcement, and even Guido van Rossum himself has been helping with the integration of both tools:

Python in Excel allows you to natively use Python inside an Excel workbook without any additional setup requirements. You only need the new PY function, which lets you input Python code directly into Excel cells: