[IPython-dev] kernel crash fixed, little utilities written

[Fernando Perez]

Hi,

the 'figure(' crash was an easy fix:

http://github.com/ipython/ipython/commit/f0e4ac07db31f9b21e84dfb1eae8380e9f4e9c4b

once I had finished a little utility I wanted you to know about:

http://github.com/ipython/ipython/commit/5c6d229ce5f249ef1f122da2ae813b70e14a3c40

Make sure you use this whenever about to send something that you're
not 100% is json encode-safe.

I just realized that it may be worth adding a noerror flag that
suppresses the ValueError exceptions that dicts can generate... There
may be cases where it's better to send a dict that drops a value
rather than crashing a kernel.  I'll add that now.

But otherwise we're in good shape.

Evan, the usability of the system is really great.  I've added little
things to the todo list, but I'm using it as my main ipython now, and
loving it!

The kernel heartbeat is also awesome: since I was checking a kernel
crasher, I could keep my session open and just keep crashing it,
editing the kernel files, and letting it restart, without losing any
of the state in my terminal :)

I did notice one thing: when we restart a kernel, we might want to
keep the client-side history alive, since precisely with a crashed
kernel you may want to re-execute prior inputs (possibly changing
something to prevent the crash again, obviously).

Anyhow, moving ahead...

Cheers,

f