The third beta of Python 3.5 is now available for early adopters. Since entering its beta phase Python 3.5 is in ‘feature freeze’, so no new features will be added.

Python 3.5 has two new syntax features – a new matrix multiplication operator a @ b, and support for coroutines with async and await syntax. The support for coroutines has a goal of establishing a common, easily approachable, mental model of asynchronous programming in Python, and of making it as close to synchronous programming as possible.

A new library module, zipapp, has also been added to improve Python ZIP application support. The new module provides an API and command line tool for creating executable Python Zip Applications. These were introduced in Python 2.6 but have not received much publicity. The new module means you can bundle an app by putting all the files, including a __main__.py file, into a directory myapp and running two commands:

$ python -m zipapp myapp

$ python myapp.pyz

Other improvements add % formatting to bytes and bytearray; a hex method has been added to bytes, bytearray, and memoryview; generators have a new gi_yieldfrom attribute, which returns the object being iterated by yield from expressions; and there’s a new RecursionError exception.

Some library modules have been significantly improved. In particular, collections.OrderedDict is now implemented in C, which improves its performance between four and 100 times.

The new version is a preview release and is not recommended for use in production settings. There is one more beta, expected at the end of July, to be followed in August by the first of three release candidates. The final version is scheduled for September 13, 2015.

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