What is the difference between Python and IPython? - python

What exactly is the difference between Python and IPython?
If I write code in Python, will it run in IPython as is or does it need to be modified?
I know IPython is supposed to be an interactive shell for Python, but is that all? Or is there a language called IPython? If I write something under IPython, will it run in Python, and vice-versa? If there are differences, how do I know what they are? Will all packages used by Python work as is in IPython?

ipython is an interactive shell built with python.
From the project website:
IPython provides a rich toolkit to help you make the most out of using Python, with:
Powerful Python shells (terminal and Qt-based).
A web-based notebook with the same core features but support for code, text, mathematical expressions, inline plots and other rich media.
Support for interactive data visualization and use of GUI toolkits.
Flexible, embeddable interpreters to load into your own projects.
Easy to use, high performance tools for parallel computing.
Note that the first 2 lines tell you it helps you make the most of using Python. Thus, you don't need to alter your code, the IPython shell runs your python code just like the normal python shell does, only with more features.
I recommend reading the IPython tutorial to get a sense of what features you gain when using IPython.

IPython is a powerful interactive Python interpreter that is more interactive comparing to the standard interpreter.
To get the standard Python interpreter you type python and you will get the >>> prompt from where you can work.
To get IPython interpreter, you need to install it first. pip install ipython.
You type ipython and you get In [1]: as a prompt and you get In [2]: for the next command. You can call history to check the list of previous commands, and write %recall 1 to recall the command.
Even you are in Python you can run shell commands directly like !ping www.google.com.
Looks like a command line Jupiter notebook if you used that before.
You can use [Tab] to autocomplete as shown in the image.

IPython is basically the "recommended" Python shell, which provides extra features. There is no language called IPython.

Even after viewing this thread, I had thought that ipython was a synonym for the python shell, in other words that typing python at the command line put one into ipython mode.
It is in fact, as referenced above, a very cool interactive shell (command line program) that can be installed from iPython.org or simply by running
pip install ipython
or the more extensive:
pip install ipython[notebook]
from the command line.

There are few differences between Python and IPython but they are only the interpretation of few syntax like the few mentioned by #Ryan Chase but deep inside the true flavor of Python is maintained even in the Ipython.
The best part of the IPython is the IPython notebook. You can put all your work into a notebook like script, image files, etc. But with base Python, you can only make the script in a file and execute it.
At start, you need to understand that the IPython is developed with the intention of supporting rich media and Python script in a single integrated container.

Compared to Python, IPython (created by Fernando Perez in 2001) can do every thing what python can do. Ipython provides even extra features like tab-completion, testing, debugging, system calls and many other features. You can think IPython as a powerful interface to the Python language.
You can install Ipython using pip - pip install ipython
You can run Ipython by typing ipython in your terminal window.

From my experience I've found that some commands which run in IPython do not run in base Python. For example, pwd and ls don't work alone in base Python. However they will work if prefaced with a % such as: %pwd and %ls.
Also, in IPython, you can run the cd command like: cd C:\Users\... This doesn't seem to work in base python, even when prefaced with a % however.

Related

VS code is not running python

I am veryy new in coding and wanted to get into it. So I downloaded VS code. But I tried to run a very simple python command and it does not let me. See the picture below.
Visual Studio code is not an IDE, it is a code editor, which means you cannot run nor debug code naturally, for that you would need to run it on the windows terminal, or install extra packages and dependencies. If youre new and just want to learn Python, i suggest starting with a python IDE like the standard one provided or something more advanced like Pycharm, and if you want to program on VsCode and in multiple languages, search some tutorials about how to compile and run code on the windows terminal.
Provide more details about how you installed python from Microsoft Store, from anaconda or via its official page https://www.python.org/downloads/. Try running
python --version
or
python3 --version
If so you can run a python file from terminal. Assuming my file is called test.py
python test.py

Blender as Python module issues to use

For test purposes,
I tried to install Blender as a Python module in a virtual environment with Python 3.7 to be sure that i can use bpy.
I follow this page for the installation (https://wiki.blender.org/wiki/Building_Blender/Other/BlenderAsPyModule)
I would like at the end, when I wrote a Python script who used blender command to be able to run outside Blender software and to get information when my script finish
So I have multiples questions:
I don't really understand this line of command for Windows and how I can adapt to my virtual environment :
xcopy /E bin\2.81 C:\Python37\2.81
I can't use 'import bpy' command even when I successfully do pip install bpy in the command line ?
For my final goal project, I'm afraid that it's impossible to do because I couldn't find examples or questions related to my project.
Can someone could explain a little if it's possible or interesting to use Blender externally ?

How to change which Python is used when opening platformio-ide-terminal in Atom on macOS

I am trying to use the "platformio-ide-terminal" package in Atom, on macOS, to open terminals within Atom.
The issue is, the terminal in Atom does not use my Anaconda Python, and thus does not have access to packages I installed using Anaconda. Typing
which python
returns
/usr/bin/python
in platformio-ide-terminal and
/Users/.../anaconda3/bin/python
in the terminal.
Typing
which python3
in platformio-ide-terminal returns
/Users/.../anaconda3/bin/python3
I am very troubled about all these different Pythons coexisting on my computer, and a general explanation about how this works would also be very welcome.
I would also like to use the same version of Python in Atom. How can I do this?
I solved it by using IDEs rather than text editors. Pycharm offers a lot of clarity on the version of Python you are using: you can choose the exact directory with the version of Python you want to use (by setting an interpreter), and then run / debug the project from Pycharm using this version of Python. Then, I deleted other directories with unused versions of Python to save the space.

Ipython change interpreter?

How does one change Python interpreter used by Ipython? Ipython is great environment for use in Python scripting, with it's powerfull autocomplete and other neat features. However under Archlinux python defaults to python 3. How it is possible to change Ipython to use /usr/bin/python2 as interpreter for Ipython. I don't need pernament solution that would affect other programs, I want to use python2 interpreter on demand: like being able to do one session of Ipython in python2 second one in python3. Is there proper way to do it.
Ipython website states, that it is able to work with even jython and other version of python, but it seems, that it does not state how to change interpreter on which ipython runs. At least I couldn't find anything. Any ideas?
Usually distrib ship with ipython for default system Python ipython3 for Python 3 and so I suppose ipython2 for Python2 when ipython default to Python3.
If you want something quick for python2, clone source, cd into it, then.
$python2 ipython.py --Usual.options

How can I run a python script on windows?

Can anyone please tell me an IDE for running python programs? Is it possible to run the program through command line?
Take a look at ActiveState's ActivePython. It's quite a nice implementation of Python on Windows. Another way is using Cygwin's Python port. These two are Python implementations. I don't use an IDE, I write my Python code in Notepad++.
To run a python program after saving it to C:\Users\vaibhav\Code\myscript.py:
ActivePython: If I remember right, ActiveState updates the path correctly. So it should be a s simple as:
Press "start" in the task bar
In the search field search for "cmd"
In the appearing box navigate to your folder with the python script: dir Users\vaibhav\Code
call python myscript.py and you're done
Cygwin: After installing Cygwin, you have a full-featured bash terminal on your Windows machine.
click on the Cygwin icon on your desktop
In the appearing window navigate to the folder with your python script: cd /cygdrive/c/Users/vaibhav/Code
type python myscript.py
e voila
IDE for running scripts? You can have any IDE you like, but if you need only to run python scripts you go like this:
python.exe pythonScript.py
I like the EasyEclipse for python distribution. You'd need to have python and java installed of course.
PyDev and Komodo Edit are 2 nice Python IDE on Windows.
I also like the SciTE text editor very much.
These 3 solutions make possible to run Python scripts
I tried to run a Python script with multiprocessing on windows. see this tutorial
It does not work on Windows, but on raspian it went very well. Thus I knew that it was a Windows problem. I installed cygwin and followed this tutorial Installing Python inside Cygwin.
After that I additionally installed numpy with the command easy_install numpy and now i can run python scripts with multiprocessing on windows (from cygwin).

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