[Python-ideas] REPL features

[Antoine Pitrou]

On Wed, 22 Aug 2018 09:38:57 -0700
Chris Barker via Python-ideas
<python-ideas at python.org> wrote:
> On Tue, Aug 21, 2018 at 3:07 PM, Jonathan Fine <jfine2358 at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> > > Maybe this is something Python's REPL should do?  
> >
> > Good idea.
> >  
> 
> I can't find (with very little effort) any documentation of this, but I
> have a vague recollection that the core devs want to keep the built-in REPL
> really simple -- more advanced features are for third party packages like
> iPython.
> 
> I tend to agree -- while something like this: "making the built-in repl
> more friendly t copy-and-paste from examples" seems like a no brainer, the
> fact is that there are a LOT of features that would make it easier for
> newbies, and in the end, you'd end up with something like iPython.
> 
> Honestly, Python does "suffer" a bit when in competition with commercial
> products, in that it is a language (and an implementation of that
> language), not an entire programming environment. So to use it, you need to
> figure out which Editor or IDE you want to use, what debugger, etc.....
> 
> And the REPL, while being pretty key to interactive data analysis, is not a
> key feature of programming languages in general, even interpreted ones.
> 
> So the solution is: use a third party solution for a complete environment
> suitable for your needs. For instance, for people doing data analysis, I
> recommend Anaconda -- then you get iPython and JUpyter (and Spyder) out of
> the box -- and away we go.
> 
> maybe it's worth a note t pyton-dev to confirm my vague impression (or some
> more thorough googling for previous discussions) -- but I wouldn't put much
> effort into ideas for the REPL without confirming that the core dev are
> open to the concept.

To me it sounds fine to improve the REPL.  Especially, being able to
paste examples without effort was a sore point for me until I finally
switched to IPython.  How much complexity and development work that
would entail I don't know, though :-)

Regards

Antoine.