Complete frustration

[Dave Angel]

norseman wrote:
> <div class="moz-text-flowed" style="font-family: -moz-fixed">hellcats 
> wrote:
>> I have Python2.5 installed on Windows XP. Whenever I double click on a
>> something.pyw file, IDLE launches and opens something.pyw in the
>> editor. I would prefer to actually *RUN* the program, not edit it. If
>> I want to edit it then I'll choose the "Edit with IDLE" context menu.
>> So I then have to press F5 to get the program to execute. Now I have
>> my program's windows along with two IDLE windows cluttering my screen
>> and task bar. WHAT IS GOING ON? I've tried changing the file
>> association to python.exe, and that works, but just ONCE (even if I
>> choose "always use the slected program to launch this kind of file").
>> IDLE may be great and all, but I fricken' don't want to see it every
>> time I just want to run a python program!!!!!
>> -- 
>> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>>
> ------------------------
> I agree completely.  Check the Python-List archives. Look for a file 
> that is dated July 8, 2008 (07/08/2008) that was sent by norseman.
>
> It works for me.
>
>
> Steve
>
> </div>
For a Unix person, you sure act like you know Windows.  But changing the 
PATH environment variable affects a command typed in the shell, but does 
not affect what happens when you either type the name of a python script 
directly, or when you double-click on such a file.  That's controlled by 
file associations.  (PATH isn't the answer in Unix either, most shells 
use the shebang at the beginning of the script.)

File associations can be controlled in a number of ways.  OPEN-WITH is 
one way.  REGEDIT is another.  In fact, any program can modify these 
settings, including your own scripts.  Something is changing things back 
on you.  But once you're having the problem of things reverting 
"automatically," a command line tool is sometimes the easiest.

Two built-in commands (they're inside the cmd.exe shell) can help.  
They're ASSOC and FTYPE

Since the extension you're bothered by is .pyw, try the following:

C:>  assoc .pyw
.pyw=Python.NoConFile

C:> ftype Python.NoConFile
Python.NoConFile="C:\ProgFiles\Python26\pythonw.exe" "%1" %*


Type them once and copy/paste results somewhere.

Then fix the problem, and look again.  Check that they work by 
double-clicking a xxx.pyw file in Explorer.

Now, run other things, especially IDLE, and recheck these two commands 
to see if something changed.  If it did, then blame whatever program you 
just ran.

My guess is that it changed when some Python installation was done.  And 
some programs have a habit of continually resetting their own 
associations.  Sometimes this is configurable, sometimes you just have 
to stop using the brain-dead program.

Notes:  your path is unlikely to be the same as mine, so replace the 
C:\ProgFiles...  string as appropriate to your preferred Python version 
location. Note you want Pythonw.exe, or you'll wind up with an extra 
shell window.   You can do the same thing for the .py extension, which 
should wind up running python.exe.  And you can make a simple two-line 
batch file to set these (assoc/ftype).  If you had several such batch 
files you could change the default python very easily.  Unlike 
environment variables, these associations are global, across all users, 
across all applications.  So changes made in one shell affect any other 
shells, as well as the Explorer windows.

Final note:  once you've got these right, you can run a script in the 
obvious way (like Unix).
    myprogram.py  parm1 parm2
will actually run    python.exe  myprogram.py  parm1 parm2

And if you add a .PY and .PYW to  PATHEXT environment variable, you can 
just run
    myprogram parm1 parm2
without any extension on the script name.   This should normally be done 
in the Control Panel->Environment vars  so it'll work in multiple DOS 
boxes, same as all environment variable changes.