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Python Development Environment?

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Owen Densmore

Python Development Environment?

Administrator

We've been looking into using Python in some modeling efforts. One
question we stumble across is "What's a good Development Environment?"

So what are your experiences? Eclipse + PyDev? Eclipse +
TruStudio? Boa Constructor? WingWare? Vanilla syntax oriented
programming editor? It'd be sweet if it were cross-platform, running
on Windows, Mac and Linux so we can all share the pain!

One issue is debugging: we'd like a visual debugger with single
stepping and break points if at all possible.

-- Owen

Owen Densmore
http://backspaces.net - http://redfish.com - http://friam.org

Martin C. Martin-2

Python Development Environment?

Hi Owen (and others),

I don't know if you've done a comparison between Python and Ruby, but
I'd be curious why you chose Python over Ruby. I have little experience
with Python and none with Ruby, but I know Ruby has closures, which (in
my mind) should make vector operations easier.

Best,
Martin

Owen Densmore wrote:

> We've been looking into using Python in some modeling efforts. One
> question we stumble across is "What's a good Development Environment?"
>
> So what are your experiences? Eclipse + PyDev? Eclipse +
> TruStudio? Boa Constructor? WingWare? Vanilla syntax oriented
> programming editor? It'd be sweet if it were cross-platform, running
> on Windows, Mac and Linux so we can all share the pain!
>
> One issue is debugging: we'd like a visual debugger with single
> stepping and break points if at all possible.
>
> -- Owen
>
> Owen Densmore
> http://backspaces.net - http://redfish.com - http://friam.org
>
>
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

Douglas Roberts-2

Python Development Environment?

In reply to this post by Owen Densmore

Debuggers are for sissies; real software developers use print statements!

--Doug

On 2/28/06, Owen Densmore <owen at backspaces.net> wrote:

>
> We've been looking into using Python in some modeling efforts. One
> question we stumble across is "What's a good Development Environment?"
>
> So what are your experiences? Eclipse + PyDev? Eclipse +
> TruStudio? Boa Constructor? WingWare? Vanilla syntax oriented
> programming editor? It'd be sweet if it were cross-platform, running
> on Windows, Mac and Linux so we can all share the pain!
>
> One issue is debugging: we'd like a visual debugger with single
> stepping and break points if at all possible.
>
> -- Owen
>
> Owen Densmore
> http://backspaces.net - http://redfish.com - http://friam.org
>
>
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
>

--
Doug Roberts, RTI
505-455-7333 - Office
505-670-8195 - Cell
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Martin C. Martin-2

Python Development Environment?

Print statements?!? What, you don't pour over a dump of memory in hex?

- Martin

Douglas Roberts wrote:

> Debuggers are for sissies; real software developers use print statements!
>
> --Doug
>
> On 2/28/06, *Owen Densmore* < owen at backspaces.net
> <mailto:owen at backspaces.net>> wrote:
>
> We've been looking into using Python in some modeling efforts. One
> question we stumble across is "What's a good Development Environment?"
>
> So what are your experiences? Eclipse + PyDev? Eclipse +
> TruStudio? Boa Constructor? WingWare? Vanilla syntax oriented
> programming editor? It'd be sweet if it were cross-platform, running
> on Windows, Mac and Linux so we can all share the pain!
>
> One issue is debugging: we'd like a visual debugger with single
> stepping and break points if at all possible.
>
> -- Owen
>
> Owen Densmore
> http://backspaces.net - http://redfish.com - http://friam.org
>
>
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
>
>
>
>
> --
> Doug Roberts, RTI
> 505-455-7333 - Office
> 505-670-8195 - Cell
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

Douglas Roberts-2

Python Development Environment?

Well, there is that -- I do love core files.

On 2/28/06, Martin C. Martin <martin at martincmartin.com> wrote:

>
> Print statements?!? What, you don't pour over a dump of memory in hex?
>
> - Martin
>
> Douglas Roberts wrote:
> > Debuggers are for sissies; real software developers use print
> statements!
> >
> > --Doug
> >
> > On 2/28/06, *Owen Densmore* < owen at backspaces.net
> > <mailto:owen at backspaces.net>> wrote:
> >
> > We've been looking into using Python in some modeling efforts. One
> > question we stumble across is "What's a good Development
> Environment?"
> >
> > So what are your experiences? Eclipse + PyDev? Eclipse +
> > TruStudio? Boa Constructor? WingWare? Vanilla syntax oriented
> > programming editor? It'd be sweet if it were cross-platform,
> running
> > on Windows, Mac and Linux so we can all share the pain!
> >
> > One issue is debugging: we'd like a visual debugger with single
> > stepping and break points if at all possible.
> >
> > -- Owen
> >
> > Owen Densmore
> > http://backspaces.net - http://redfish.com - http://friam.org
> >
> >
> >
> > ============================================================
> > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> > Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> > lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > --
> > Doug Roberts, RTI
> > 505-455-7333 - Office
> > 505-670-8195 - Cell
> >
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > ============================================================
> > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> > Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> > lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
>

Roger Frye-2

Python Development Environment?

On Tue, 28 Feb 2006 10:14:13 -0700, Douglas Roberts <doug at parrot-farm.net>
wrote:
> Well, there is that -- I do love core files.
0xDEADBEEF

I like PythonWin, but it's only for Windows.
-Roger

Douglas Roberts-2

Python Development Environment?

On 2/28/06, Roger Frye <rfrye at commodicast.com> wrote:
>
>
> ... but it's only for Windows.

<shudder> I'd rather have my fingernails pulled out.

-Roger

-Doug

============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
>

--
Doug Roberts, RTI
505-455-7333 - Office
505-670-8195 - Cell
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David A. Hite

Python Development Environment?

vi : The One True Editor

Douglas Roberts wrote:

>
> On 2/28/06, *Roger Frye* <rfrye at commodicast.com
> <mailto:rfrye at commodicast.com>> wrote:
>
>
> ... but it's only for Windows.
>
>
> <shudder> I'd rather have my fingernails pulled out.
>
> -Roger
>
>
> -Doug
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
>
>
>
>
> --
> Doug Roberts, RTI
> 505-455-7333 - Office
> 505-670-8195 - Cell
>
>------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>============================================================
>FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
>Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
>lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
>

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Douglas Roberts-2

Python Development Environment?

Now, *that* is a bit extreme...

On 2/28/06, David A. Hite <hite at lanl.gov> wrote:

>
> vi : The One True Editor
>
> Douglas Roberts wrote:
>
>
> On 2/28/06, Roger Frye <rfrye at commodicast.com> wrote:
> >
> >
> > ... but it's only for Windows.
>
>
> <shudder> I'd rather have my fingernails pulled out.
>
> -Roger
>
>
> -Doug
>
> ============================================================
> > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> > Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> > lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
> >
>
>
>
> --
> Doug Roberts, RTI
> 505-455-7333 - Office
> 505-670-8195 - Cell
>
> ------------------------------
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
>
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
>
>

Martin C. Martin-2

Python Development Environment?

Yeah, I agree. You mean "ed" doesn't count?

Douglas Roberts wrote:

> Now, *that* is a bit extreme...
>
> On 2/28/06, *David A. Hite* <hite at lanl.gov <mailto:hite at lanl.gov>> wrote:
>
> vi : The One True Editor
>
> Douglas Roberts wrote:
>
>>
>> On 2/28/06, *Roger Frye* <rfrye at commodicast.com
>> <mailto:rfrye at commodicast.com>> wrote:
>>
>>
>> ... but it's only for Windows.
>>
>>
>> <shudder> I'd rather have my fingernails pulled out.
>>
>> -Roger
>>
>>
>> -Doug
>>
>> ============================================================
>> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
>> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
>> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Doug Roberts, RTI
>> 505-455-7333 - Office
>> 505-670-8195 - Cell
>>
>>------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>>============================================================
>>FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
>>Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
>>lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at
>>http://www.friam.org
>>
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
>
>
>
>
> --
> Doug Roberts, RTI
> 505-455-7333 - Office
> 505-670-8195 - Cell
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

Gary Schiltz-3

Python Development Environment?

In reply to this post by Owen Densmore

I did a brief stint as a professional python developer (at BioReason),
and I used Wing IDE from WingWare (as you mentioned). I found its
debugger to be quite nice and was overall quite happy with it.

// Gary

Owen Densmore wrote:

Roger Critchlow-2

Python Development Environment?

Check out DrPython. If nothing else, it's written in Python and
cross-platform via WxWidgets.

May not have an integrated debugger, but maybe it's too obvious to mention.

-- rec --

John Pfersich

Python Development Environment?

In reply to this post by Owen Densmore

At 09:58 AM 2/28/2006 -0700, Owen wrote:
>We've been looking into using Python in some modeling efforts. One
>question we stumble across is "What's a good Development Environment?"
>
>So what are your experiences? Eclipse + PyDev? Eclipse +
>TruStudio? Boa Constructor? WingWare? Vanilla syntax oriented
>programming editor? It'd be sweet if it were cross-platform, running
>on Windows, Mac and Linux so we can all share the pain!

I use jEdit as a vanilla syntax oriented editor. It's cross-platform
(written in Java) and has quite a large number of add-on modules. It may
have Python oriented add-ons; I don't use Python (ugh).

Why not try Ruby if you're starting from scratch? Python has some nasty
column-based formatting rules that I find too reminiscent of my old punch
card days (or is it daze). I'd say that Ruby's a better choice unless
there's some Python libraries that would be useful. Quite a few OO
luminaries have jumped on the Ruby bandwagon over the past few years. I've
been a Rubyist for a couple of years (I first tried Ruby in 2001), and I
find the language to be OK. I still prefer Smalltalk.

GNU Smalltalk is much like Ruby, but usually faster (sometimes much faster
than it or Python) and the code can be transferred to other Smalltalks
(like Squeak, Cincom VisualWorks, the ex-IBM VAST, or the Windows only
Dolphin ST and quite a few others) pretty easily. With Smalltalk you'll
definitely get a visual debugger in the environment (except for GST) that
will allow you to fix the code and restart the process in real time.
Eclipse is based on the Smalltalk environment (as are all IDEs, AFAIK), and
Eclipse is a really lame imitation of the Smalltalk environment.

It all comes down to which language will fit your needs best.

>One issue is debugging: we'd like a visual debugger with single
>stepping and break points if at all possible.
>
> -- Owen

Robert Holmes-2

Python Development Environment?

In reply to this post by Owen Densmore

I've been using Activestate Komodo as a Python IDE for the past year or so,
pretty much on a daily basis. I've been impressed with it. Yes it has a
visual debugger, which is pretty solid. Yes, it's available on Linux, Mac &
Windows.

If you are a cross-language kinda person it does have one interesting
feature: it also acts as an IDE for Perl & Tcl.

True it costs money, but it's got a sensible pricing structure: a licence
for business use costs $295, a licence for personal use costs $29.95. And
you can get a free 21-day evalution for www.activestate.com

Robert

On 2/28/06, Owen Densmore <owen at backspaces.net> wrote:

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Giles Bowkett

Python Development Environment?

I hate to admit it but I do pretty much everything with vi and print statements.

Ruby rocks, btw. But then I still love Perl, and I do pretty much
everything with vi and print statements, so, you know, grain of salt
type thing.

As far as I can tell Python's big strength over Ruby (in large
corporate settings at least) is its **lack** of flexibility. It's
supposed to ease maintenance and improve performance. "Perlish" seems
to be a bad word among hardcore Python types, and Ruby does give you a
lot of Perlish freedoms. The problem with Perlish freedoms, as far as
I understand it, is that they can be unexpected and weird to debug.
But the upside is that they're lots of fun. Also, it seems a lot of
the buzz on Ruby is driven by the buzz on Rails, and Rails takes a lot
of advantage of Ruby's dynamic features. It might have been much, much
more cumbersome if it had been written in Python.

I've only done a few toy projects in either Python or Ruby at the
moment, so I couldn't comment beyond that, really, but I do share
Martin's curiousity.

Oh yeah, and Smalltalk? Please. Smalltalk is like so mainstream. It's
all about CLU and Eiffel. Get with the times, man.

--
Giles Goat Boy

http://gilesmakesmusic.blogspot.com
http://gileswritescode.blogspot.com

Robert Holmes-2

Python Development Environment?

In reply to this post by John Pfersich

On 2/28/06, John Pfersich <jp1660 at att.net> wrote:
>
> <snip>...Python has some nasty column-based formatting rules that I find
> too reminiscent of my old punch card days (or is it daze)...

When I first started to use Python I thought the whole column-based,
whitespace delimited thing was completely stupid. But pretty soon I found I
was getting hooked. Why? Because I was ending up with attractive looking
code that - because of the compulsory blocking style - was really easy to
debug. None of this worrying whether I should be putting the { at the end of
the line or the start of the next and if it does go on the next whether the
{ as well as the enclosed code should be indented.

Or maybe the fact that I'm worrying about formatting consistency is a
symptom of incipient OCD and I should just get over it....

Robert
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Giles Bowkett

Python Development Environment?

In reply to this post by Martin C. Martin-2

On 2/28/06, Martin C. Martin <martin at martincmartin.com> wrote:
> Hi Owen (and others),
>
> I don't know if you've done a comparison between Python and Ruby, but
> I'd be curious why you chose Python over Ruby. I have little experience
> with Python and none with Ruby, but I know Ruby has closures, which (in
> my mind) should make vector operations easier.
>
> Best,
> Martin

Actually I think I have the answer to this one: it's all about
Blender. Blender's an excellent 3-d animation package written in
Python which supports Python scripts with access to its internal
objects, if I understand correctly. I think it even supports all sorts
of nonlinear fluid dynamics now too as a result of like a Google
coding contest or something. So, if you want to do some simulations
with nice demo-able results, it's a pretty logical choice.

Also, I think Python supports closures to an extent:

http://ivan.truemesh.com/archives/000392.html

--
Giles Goat Boy

http://gilesmakesmusic.blogspot.com
http://gileswritescode.blogspot.com

Martin C. Martin-2

Python Development Environment?

[At risk of diverting into a detailed discussion of languages,]

What about e.g. sorting a list based on some function of each element?
e.g. in Groovy I can write:

myList.sort { it.field1 * it.field2 }

Or, similarly, find the object that maximizes some function, e.g.

myList.max { pow(it.field1, 2) }

?

Python has language syntax (i.e. list comprehensions) for two basic uses
of closures, but I'm wondering about other cases. Maybe lambda
functions are the answer...

- Martin

Giles Bowkett wrote:

> On 2/28/06, Martin C. Martin <martin at martincmartin.com> wrote:
>
>>Hi Owen (and others),
>>
>>I don't know if you've done a comparison between Python and Ruby, but
>>I'd be curious why you chose Python over Ruby. I have little experience
>>with Python and none with Ruby, but I know Ruby has closures, which (in
>>my mind) should make vector operations easier.
>>
>>Best,
>>Martin
>
>
> Actually I think I have the answer to this one: it's all about
> Blender. Blender's an excellent 3-d animation package written in
> Python which supports Python scripts with access to its internal
> objects, if I understand correctly. I think it even supports all sorts
> of nonlinear fluid dynamics now too as a result of like a Google
> coding contest or something. So, if you want to do some simulations
> with nice demo-able results, it's a pretty logical choice.
>
> Also, I think Python supports closures to an extent:
>
> http://ivan.truemesh.com/archives/000392.html
>
> --
> Giles Goat Boy
>
> http://gilesmakesmusic.blogspot.com
> http://gileswritescode.blogspot.com
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

Stephen Guerin

Python Development Environment?

In reply to this post by Giles Bowkett

Yep, Giles is right. Blender as the presentation visualization environment was
driving the Python language choice to a large degree. We're ultimately looking
for a suite of cross-platform opensource / free environments to serve as
lingua-franca development environments for the simulation and visualization
community here (NetLogo, and Processing are other example components in that
suite).

That said, Ruby does have a lot of promise; the modestly-priced SketchUp
(http://www.sketchup.com/) is worth exploring as a vis toolkit with Ruby as its
scripting language.

-S

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Giles Bowkett [mailto:gilesb at gmail.com]
> Sent: Wednesday, March 01, 2006 9:44 AM
> To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Python Development Environment?
>
>
> On 2/28/06, Martin C. Martin <martin at martincmartin.com> wrote:
> > Hi Owen (and others),
> >
> > I don't know if you've done a comparison between Python and Ruby, but
> > I'd be curious why you chose Python over Ruby. I have little experience
> > with Python and none with Ruby, but I know Ruby has closures, which (in
> > my mind) should make vector operations easier.
> >
> > Best,
> > Martin
>
> Actually I think I have the answer to this one: it's all about
> Blender. Blender's an excellent 3-d animation package written in
> Python which supports Python scripts with access to its internal
> objects, if I understand correctly. I think it even supports all sorts
> of nonlinear fluid dynamics now too as a result of like a Google
> coding contest or something. So, if you want to do some simulations
> with nice demo-able results, it's a pretty logical choice.
>
> Also, I think Python supports closures to an extent:
>
> http://ivan.truemesh.com/archives/000392.html
>
> --
> Giles Goat Boy
>
> http://gilesmakesmusic.blogspot.com
> http://gileswritescode.blogspot.com
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
>
>

Douglas Roberts-2

Python Development Environment?

In reply to this post by Giles Bowkett

I found myself supressing an urge to lash back at the smalltalk suggestion
as well. Smalltalk is interesting from a purely academic perspective. It
is *not* an appropriate language for developing real-world applications.

--Doug

On 2/28/06, Giles Bowkett <gilesb at gmail.com> wrote:

>
>
>
> Oh yeah, and Smalltalk? Please. Smalltalk is like so mainstream. It's
> all about CLU and Eiffel. Get with the times, man.
>
> --
> Giles Goat Boy
>
> http://gilesmakesmusic.blogspot.com
> http://gileswritescode.blogspot.com
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
>

123