[Idle-dev] IDLE interpreter window

[Albert Brandl]

>What is "usual shell behaviour"?  There are dozens of shells out there.

My fault - sorry. Of cause there are dozens of shells out there. What I was
talking about was the "shell metaphor":

Each shell I know (not too many, I confess) uses the concept of a prompt.
Interaction with the shell occurs at the prompt. You enter a command,
press Return and watch what happens. The shell processes the command,
presents the results (if any) and shows a new prompt line.

The cursor has very limited abilities to move:
- left and right, bounded by the prompt and the end of the issued command,
     respectively
- up and down scrolls through the history

>If they think of it as an editor window instead (which it is, by design and
>by implementation), that behavior for Up-Arrow is certainly expected.

Frankly, I don't think that "Editor window" is a good metaphor for the
*Python Shell*. The main purpose is to execute commands issued by the
user - something usually accomplished with a _shell_, not an editor.

>[...] that's one reason the IDLE "shell" is much better.  Not kidding!  I
>use it heavily, and the ability to edit the shell window in arbitrary ways
>is *great* for saving the important parts of an interactive session.

If you copy the relevant contents of the shell window with the mouse, paste
it into an editor window and edit it _there_, you get the same effect (except
that you do not have to be careful not to press the "return" key, since
it moves the cursor to the prompt). So where's the benefit?

     Best regards,

          Albert