My problems with this chapter are that it mostly ignores Windows, omits IDLE which has most of the 'advanced features' discussed, and some others (I could fix this), confuses a bit 'interpreter' as code executor versus 'interactive interpreter' as interface to an interpreter (Shell), and seems seems to mention a somewhat arbitrary subset of alternative shells.

Other than the fact that bpython and ptpython cross list each other (and IPython), what evidence do you have that ptpython is 'both mature and popular enough to merit inclusion'?  (I know, difficult question given no visible criteria.)

I looked at the history of the last paragraph and it seems that is was added 8/13/2009 by Georg Brandl in c5605dffdb226e85f415bd6edb441dad714fbc0c, which merged about 16 revisions from the py3k branch.  The only change since was markup.

It seems to me that the wiki might be a better place for a list of alternate shells, if not one already.  I believe there is already a page for editors or IDEs.