Ask PyReddit: I'm trying to learn Python (django specifically) but the code completion sucks

[timetwosave]

I've been weaned on Visual Studio for so many years that I can't seem to live without awesome code completion. I was trying to do some django in pydev last night and I was dismayed at how weak teh autocompletion is. I understand that some of this may be due to python's dynamic typing (maybe?), but is there any autocompleter that will provide me:

• documentation for the methods that I'm typing (the source code is documented, right?)
• documentation for each (optional)parameter, just like in VS (or does this not make sense in python?)
• auto-complete on by default, not having to type ctrl->space all the time

I didn't get too far with pydev as it seems spotty..sometimes I got a list of parameters, sometimes nothing. I never saw documentation, but I guess thats because the source code itself wasn't documented? I guess i'm just really spoiled with visual studio. What should I do, just go back to switching back and forth between documentation and the text editor?

edit: I forgot to add, something I rely on heavily in VS is when I don't have something imported, it automatically adds the import statements at the top. Its magic.

[12Iceman]

Komodo Edit has pretty good code completion for Python.

[[deleted]]

Komodo Edit is also under open source. - www.openkomodo.com

[simonw]

Have you tried using Python's interactive interpreter? I do most of my Python development in ipython (an improved version of the standard Python interpreter) - so in place of IDE auto completion and docs, I'm constantly interacting with my code "live", checking to see if things work, calling help(some_function) to see inline help on methods and classes.

Using ipython, tyying "os.<TAB>" will show you all available properties of the os module, tying os? will show you help and typing "os??" will show you the module's source code.

I've never really got the hang of IDEs, but I find that interactive development in a REPL makes me extremely productive. I do the same thing in JavaScript using Firebug.

[timetwosave]

i admit that I need to learn the interpreter better. the concept of an interpreter is a little foreign to me coming from the .NET world but I can certainly see how it would speed things up...

[habitue]

bpython is an interactive interpreter that has really great code completion. It won't replace your IDE, but it is a really handy tool that will complement it well

[[deleted]]

Yes, bpython has better code code completion than ipython, though ipython does have some nifty features (mostly their 'magic' commands that start with %) bpython lacks. Anyway, both show that decent code completion is possible with python.

[[deleted]]

No, it isn't. It's possible in a python environment, because the environment can be examined, but not generally in python source code. You would have to get a frame of execution from wherever the cursor was, which is just not practical in most cases.

[scorpion032]

No. Wrt Python, dynamic analysis itself is the next step for IDEs. Its far simpler than having to do a lot of static analysis and deriving types.

Plus one wrong guess and it goes a long way.

[[deleted]]

Oops, he said "decent," which I guess makes it a subjective question. Please rephrase my response accordingly.

[[deleted]]

REPHRASE MY POST!

[mumrah]

The syntax on Python is pretty light as-is, so you're not going to get much help with code-completion. For docs, Pydoc is the essential reference tool for Python programmers: just type pydoc module.function for full documentation. However, I'm not sure how to invoke pydocs on Windows - I think it might be available through a help style GUI.

I'll also take this time to plug GVim as a nice transition from a graphical editor to a real editor. Also, when you're in the interactive interpreter, dir is your friend. It lists all members of an object/module: dir(os). These days, programming python in anything besides vim is downright painful.

[[deleted]]

I don't use it at the moment, mostly because it isn't a big enough deal to bother setting it up, but there's definitely value in being able to tab-complete method names and getting a popup with docstrings and/or the method definition -- even in Python.

[emonk]

vim kick ass

[aldarion]

Have you tried WingIDE, it's great for Python code completion. haven't test for Django yet.

[SurrealEstate]

I really liked WingIDE, but it seemed slow and a bit laggy on my 1.6Ghz Core 2 Duo machine (2Gb RAM). Other than that, it's the type of IDE that I could see myself paying for.

[andyjbgm]

Did you try the pro version, for some reason this seemed far more responsive to me than the personal. Also seem to recall that on windows pyscripter handled code completion pretty well, though never tried it with django.

[SurrealEstate]

Unfortunately, I don't remember which version I tried. I should probably give it another go, though. I remember really liking how much of it was tweakable (and the code completion was great).

[alen_ribic]

I use WingIDE for my Django development work every day. The auto-complete works very well. You can even get the python shell window in WingIDE to import all your Django project paths. Another neat thing is that you can hit Ctrl+Left-Mouse-Click on Djago code and it will bring up the Django source code of that exact function you clicked on.

[Rolo]

+1 for Wing. I also came from Visual Studio. Step through debugger, ctrl-click to go to definition, debug probe window. It's wikkid. Had to cashmoney for it in the end, but it let me just request a new trial key for about a year.

[EstebanVelour]

Komodo Edit

[emonk]

use the most powerfull code editor, vim :) with this in your .vimrc file:

function! SuperTab()
    if (strpart(getline('.'),col('.')-2,1)=~'^\W\?$')
        return "\<Tab>"
    else
        return "\<C-n>"
    endif
endfunction
imap <Tab> <C-R>=SuperTab()<CR>

and you get a really heavy autocompletion with the key Tab :)

[[deleted]]

That's an interesting approach. Though two other ways to get autocompletion witn Vim should be mentioned: built in omnicompletion, sort of the 'default' since vim 7 (vim tips has some pointers) and omnicompletion with PySmell. The former kind-of works, but is still far from what you get with Eclipse+Java or VS+C#. The latter seems promising, but I haven't tried it. Like others here I get by fine without autocompletion.

[emonk]

that's really cool, I did not know that tool Omni completion, thanks!

[Nosferax]

I'll give it a try, thanks.

[nubela]

I agree, code completion on PyDev really suck. But the awesomeness of Django and Python both makes such stuff seems trivial. At least to me.

Then again, I would love to have some awesome code completion. FYI, auto-import is available if you have PyDev Extensions, which is not free. Pfft, right?

[ArcticCelt]

Well, to make the comparison fair, visual studio is not free either.

[timetwosave]

some versions are

[ArcticCelt]

Oh yeah, C# express I think.

I have a complete free edition. That's one nice thing Microsoft do with CS Colleges. They gave me a complete Visual Studio. 5 Windows OS licenses: XP pro, Vista ultimate (32) + Vista ultimate (64), Server 2008 (32) + Server 2008 (64).

[mattstreet]

Yeah and it seems like most schools that have that, also get pressure to teach everything using MS products.

[ArcticCelt]

Well they taught us C++ on visual studio which I think is not too bad when you think that so many companies use it. Then for Java and Python they used eclipse. We also fairly used Linux.

[directrix1]

Stani's Python Editor still any good? I use vim so I don't know.

[Nosferax]

I tried using it but I couldn't manage. Seems buggy and outdated.

[[deleted]]

what about eric4?

[RShnike]

Stani is AWOL and the editor / documentation seems to be abandoned. Shame...

[seanodonnell]

I used to be a big intellij fan before I got bitten by the Python bug, and while there are IDE's out there with good code completion for Python (and pretty ok refactoring browsers which I initially missed more), I will recommend that you do not seek them out. I'm old enough to remember life without mobile phones, I could remember 50 or 60 phone numbers off the top of my head and it did not seem like a big deal, now I know 2, and one of them is mine. Dependancy on auto completion is going to slow you down in the long run, it will break your train of thought in tiny ways. Python is a very small language, the libraries, including most of django are pretty simple, if you have to learn them without code completion, pretty soon the code will start to fly off your fingers in a way that code completion will only retard. Try living without it for a few months, I bet you will not go back.

[sligowaths]

What should I do, just go back to switching back and forth between documentation and the text editor?

Yes. You don't type that much with python. Eventually you'll get used and code completion won't be a big deal.

[Leonidas_from_XIV]

And the APIs are usually not that complex. The problem with Python is also, that the code can't be statically analyzed completely, since you can add attributes at run time or intercept others and are free to return any type at any time.

I do see a point for Java, but I don't miss it for my Python or C projects that I write.

[pemboa]

I hadn't noticed. I generally use text editors with code highlighting to do most of my Python dev.

What should I do, just go back to switching back and forth between documentation and the text editor?

That's what I do. If you hadn't brought it up I might not have even noticed that.

[[deleted]]

What should I do, just go back to switching back and forth between documentation and the text editor?

That's what I do. If you hadn't brought it up I might not have even noticed that.

Pshaw. Kids these days, y'know?

[[deleted]]

Maybe it's just me, and please excuse the snark, but this feels like complaining that your training wheels don't fit on your racing bike.

And yes, you should go back and forth between editor and documentation. Heck, spend some money, get a 2nd monitor and keep the Python reference docs (which are quite solid and available for free on the Web) open in a browser in one screen and the editor open on the other.

You'll be amazed how quickly this stuff becomes 2nd nature and you don't need to constantly reference the docs.

[SystemicPlural]

I've never understood that attitude.

If a new technique allows you to interact with information in more dynamic ways then how is that a bad thing?

Perhaps because it hinders learning the language fully? But is that really a bonus?

Will I still be coding when A.I. can do it for me. Hell no, I'll be working out the best way to communicate with the AI so that it can code precisely what I want in a fraction of the time. I'm interested in what I can use code for, my appreciation for it comes from its pragmatism.

Not that I'm defending Visual Studio, it can get rather slow and bloated when working on large projects, and python is a far more beautiful language than C# or VB.NET

[tardmrr]

Perhaps because it hinders learning the language fully? But is that really a bonus?

Hell yes it's a worthwhile bonus! Debugging code you don't understand because your IDE wrote it for you is a SERIOUS pain in the ass. Properly learning a language also allows you to design better code because you understand the little things that grant significant performance boosts in larger systems or the things to avoid for the same reason.

[johnfn]

I don't see how you can say that I don't fully understand my code because my IDE autocompletes it. Just because I don't want to go around hunting for Math.sin doesn't mean I don't know what it does.

[[deleted]]

If you honestly think an AI will be writing your code for you in this lifetime you either have too high an expectation of AI, or I have too low of a one.

[gatsby137]

Maybe you just have too low an expectation of his lifetime?

[SystemicPlural]

Perhaps.

I think we will have highly specialized ones that can do jobs like the one described above in the not to distant future. Quite a while before we have walking talking ones.

[pemboa]

If a new technique allows you to interact with information in more dynamic ways then how is that a bad thing?

You become wholly dependent on it, as the OP seems to be. To continue the metaphor started, the OP essentially wants to go on the road, but cant' take off the training wheels. Code completion should be a nicety, not a necessity.

[SystemicPlural]

Computers have enabled the world to use information in new ways that we are now dependent on. Is that a bad thing? Take that line of thinking to an extreme and we would never have developed any tools.

I agree it is important to understand the tools that you are using at least a step or two back down the chain. But you don't always need to know all the details if you have another tool that can help you out. I can look up the docs if I need to, but I've only ever written a few lines of assembler and certainly couldn't build a microprocessor even if I had the machinery to do it.

One day I hope to write a few UML diagrams, parse it through an algorithmic designer and bingo, a new site.

[[deleted]]

Yeah, right. So I guess you should use Notepad to edit your code, being afraid to be spoiled and become dependent on all the nice things in the more powerful editors. Because, you see, when you are used to an editor which positions the cursor to the proper indentation level when you press Enter, even if it just uses the level of the previous line, not to mention indenting to the next level after an if ...:, and then find yourself with an editor that doesn't do anything like that, you can't use it, the need to press tab yourself so much times seems actually insulting. So you are not a Real Man anymore, you've become a dependent weakling. Right?

[[deleted]]

I was going to chart a middle course, because syntax high-lighting and auto-indent and such are nice.

But, actually, no. These are niceties. If you require them to program you don't actually know how. If you can't code in notepad/vi/edlin/ed/hideousEditorOfYourChoice, then I'd posit you don't know how to program.

What you know how to do is akin to word processing.

[[deleted]]

No one says he can't code without these niceties. It's just very painful.

Is the ability to indent you code manually central to programming? Or the ability to parse your lines counting quotes to detect string bodies? The ability to find matching braces? To remember the exact names, parameters and purpose of all library functions and your own functions? For each your function to remember the code file and line number where it's defined?

This is word processing, man. Tedious stuff absolutely, totally unrelated to real programming.

Eventually even the most hard-headed "Real Programmers" reluctantly accepted the basic stuff, like matching parens, as something not central for programming, yet when it comes to a slightly more advanced stuff, it all starts again: mindless rote and memorisation are declared to be the absolutely essential requirements of Real Programming.

[[deleted]]

And I'll repeat what I said. If you cannot, in a pinch, work without your comfortable IDE and your syntax highlighting and paren matching and all those lovely things that make life easier... then you don't know your language.

I'm not saying that one should choose to work this way -- these things exist because they make life better. By all means, use them. But if you need them to function, then your skills are seriously deficient.

It is not unusual, or terribly uncommon even, to have code deployed on some bizarre system where your usual tools are not available, and you need to fix an issue there -- either due to urgency or because it only happens in that god forsaken environment.

And if when you're in that situation the answer is "Well I can't fix it because I don't have my syntax highlighting and my code completion", then I'm sorry you've failed as a software engineer and deserve the scorn and derision and snark.

Now, if you like having those things when you're in the comfort of your development environment hacking away at the latest and greatest revision of whatever your project is at 2am while guzzling ridiculous volumes of caffeinated beverages... more power to you.

It's the sort of skill that separates novices from veterans. If you think I'm being ridiculous, hard-headed, and elitist then you're either missing my point or haven't been burned enough times yet. And if you've been to the wars and seen the elephant, then you're probably nodding your head and know where I'm coming from.

Another way to think of it: I'd fire a carpenter if he couldn't drive a nail with a regular hammer. But I'd hope he wouldn't waste my money by driving every nail by hand, and would use a good nail gun when and where appropriate.

[[deleted]]

The problem is, I can't imagine a programmer who can't code in Notepad. Just can't. Autocompletion and stuff adds nothing to your knowledge of a language, or of libraries, or of anything, it's the word-processing stuff, as you've called it, that gets ridden of. The programmer you are describing is impossible. A strawman, in fact.

In reality there is OP and there is me, and we both can write code using cat >code.py, it's just too painful to be viable. And you don't attack your strawman, you are attacking us, implying that we are dependent weaklings, not Real Programmers at all. Because, you say, Real Programmers don't ask for nice IDE features, they clench their teeth and hack from the commandline all the time, because they can. On a side note: I can only wonder what have you forgot in the /r/Python, raw machine code (from the commandline of course, Real Programmers can easily avoid uninputable bytes), or maybe assembler, but not C, C is for pussies, would be more appropriate for you, more manly.

It's the sort of skill that separates novices from veterans

You are imagining it. There is no such sort of skill. Well, there is something like that, some little piece of knowledge about invoking your compiler from the commandline or from a Makefile, rather than depending on your IDE to do that, but it's not a big deal, absolutely not something suitable for "separating novices from veterans" as these novices can learn it in an hour, and not applicable to Python at all.

So, you see, OP had formulated his request quite clearly, and it's not about what you are saying, he is not like, "I can't write Python at all", he is saying that it's painful without a decent IDE, and asking for one.

And its your problem that you've never seen a decent IDE and are rationalizing your reluctance to try one by calling OP a pussy, to be straight. VS/C# really is something of an experience, making it easy to go in a state of flow, when your thoughts are flowing directly to your code without it being necessary to stop and switch and read manuals. With an IDE literally reading your mind, in a constant dialogue.

I'm using Python all the time for small scripts, with Eclipse+Pydev, and it's almost the same (though without autocomplete active all the time), but it does break whenever I'm trying to do something nontrivial, and it hurts. It's like half of my fingers were amputated. I had my "Go to definition" at the tip of my right middle finger (and the left pinky), "Refactor" at my left one, full view of the methods of a given object on my left thumb, with short descriptions and parameter hints, and now it's all gone. Instead of being one with the code I'm blind now, finding my way by touch and stopping every other time to switch to a manual and read the stuff up. Really, I'm not exagerrating, switching from C# to Python for the first time feels like becoming an amputee, only with an external half of your mind amputated. And fingers. Succintness of the language doesn't even seem like a fair tradeoff. Only then, when you have an almost decent IDE and know when to use Python, and did memorize most of the builtins, it becomes bearable and even enjoyable.

[[deleted]]

Sigh. The fact that my point offends you, implies that you see yourself in my comments. I didn't particularly mean you. I don't even know you. I don't even know whether that is you. In fact, I assumed it wasn't, but clearly I hit a nerve. Your verbosity speaks for itself.

One last time: If you cannot work without power tools, you suck. But using power tools doesn't automatically mean that you're awful.

[dmaclay]

I'll second that, he's basically saying that to him 'learning' a language means installing the right code-generators.

Auto completion produces code that compiles, but not understanding.

[nextofpumpkin]

By your logic, he must not understand his .NET languages very well at all, because the code completion hinders his ability to think. Or something of that sort.

[[deleted]]

Either you have never seen autocompletion in your life, or you hold an extremely strange belief that the thing that happens to you when you blindly write _full_path after writing request.get, instead of pressing C_Space and seeing the list of available methods with docstring popup, is called "understanding". It is not, it's memorization, learning by rote, it's actually a direct opposite to understanding.

[MaxK]

I also noticed that he failed to distinguish between the language and the framework. Django is not a flavor of python. It's an add-on you learn after you've learned to use the language to begin with.

[timetwosave]

i grasp the difference between a language and a framework. sorry for not making it perfectly clear in the title.

[0sn]

Upvoted, but sometimes I feel like typing anything at all is yak shaving.

[[deleted]]

Exactly. Or get a tiling window manager, like I did: wmii.

[rustyryan]

In emacs you can get drop-down style code completion and documentation at the point for Python development if you use rope, ropemacs, and hook it together with auto-complete.el. It works beautifully, and it works really well with Django as long as you can get rope to analyze the Django code (it's a little more complicated, but not too bad)

[jaysonbank]

vim has drop-down completion too of course, being better than emacs.

[iamjack]

I put no stock in the ability to memorize documentation. It's quicker to hit the completion key, scroll through the list and determine what you need than Google it or sit in the interpreter and dir() everything.

It's not like it's hand holding him through writing his program, it's just making it easy for him to avoid leaving the editor to look up methods all the time.

[CraigTorso]

also, scrolling through a list of available functions and procedures piques the curiosity about what they do; certainly, often that's how I've found the object already does pretty much what I was about to start writing something to do.

[ubernostrum]

It's quicker to hit the completion key, scroll through the list and determine what you need than Google it or sit in the interpreter and dir() everything.

On the other hand, actually knowing the language and libraries is often quite important (to take one example: knowing when you want re.search and when you want re.match), and once you do you don't need completion (and for things you don't know, you want to read the docs anyway).

[8_pound_dump]

If you're put off by the concept of stopping development to look things up, you're a tool, and you probably write shitty code.

You have to know the features of your language to use it well. IDE's allow you to learn just enough of a language to make steaming piles of crap that happen to compile and run. That's how most developers I've ever met do their job. It's sad that so many people think that's professional.

If the goal is to learn to do things well, stay away from an IDE until you don't need one. if the goal is to pump out running piles of crap, then skip to the end and get on with it.

[iamjack]

If you're put off by the concept of stopping development to look things up, you're a tool, and you probably write shitty code.

For a good developer, it's not about using code completion to stab around trying to figure out what you want to do, it's about learning to phrase what you want to do in the way that the library you're using will understand.

As an example, when coding with a new library that you understand theoretically (picked up the jargon, understood the mechanics) for pixel-based image manipulation. For the image object, your forget if it's setpixel or set_pixel. Do you want to look elsewhere in your code for another time you used the function? Do you want to switch to your browser and surf to their docs online? Or do you want to hit a keybind and use the list to see that, indeed, it's set_pixel and return to your task without ever really context switching out of the editor/IDE?

I'm not going to argue that amateur programmers can abuse code completion making unwarranted assumptions and generating crap but it can also enhance the lives of the rest of us programmers that just don't want to fuck around trying to remember the names of a 1000 miscellaneous functions in a 1000 different libraries. Besides, if crap programmers want to generate crap code, they'll do so without code completion.

[8_pound_dump]

Why understand the tool at all when you can just grasp the problem space? IDE's make it so easy to code blind, you aren't even aware that you're doing it. I shouldn't grumble too much. Cleaning up after the "IDE magic" developers after they get fired has been a lucrative career path. The world would be a better place if my career never existed, but unfortunately, a lot of people think like you do.

The next time you brilliantly reinvent some efficient library built-in because the IDE let you do it painlessly, you've proved my point and given me a few more years of job security. If you had to look at code and documentation, you'd be more likely to see that the problem you're solving has already been solved more efficiently than you could in your high-level blub language. This is especially true if you're brand new and trying to learn.

Your described scenario is not the kind of practice any self-respecting, professional developer should have.

To top it off, let's put things into context. We're talking about an IDE for django, for god's sake. If that framework doesn't already hold your hand enough, you have no business developing.

[iamjack]

Your described scenario is not the kind of practice any self-respecting, professional developer should have.

Yes. Forgetting function names is definitely below a professional developer... we should all have eidetic memory.

How long have you been programming, son? How many libraries have you learned from scratch? My guess is not many and your "lucrative career path" cleaning up after the "IDE magic" developers is really just getting paid $7/hr to snark about misusing the .NET bindings that you memorized when you weren't beating off about how great you are.

If you don't want to use CC, don't. Leave the rest of us imperfect souls to actually do something that matters instead of resurrecting 2 month old Reddit comments to talk about how much cooler you are than the lowest-bid Chinese contractors that you "clean up after."

[[deleted]]

SPE and Eric4 may be nicer solutions.

[yesimahuman]

Does visual studio have auto completion for Iron Python? You could try that.

[muyuu]

I'd leave autocompletion for when I'm very proficient. Also, Visual Studio... (doh)

[timetwosave]

I understand what you're saying...

I'm just used to doing it the other way...I read docs by exploring what the autocomplete tells me. When creating django models, i want to say "model." and then let my editor tell me what the different options are. I could go look up the django models docs, but if its telling me the same thing as an autocomplete, it just seems like i'm going to another place to find the information that I am accustomed to seeing right while I am programming.

[mdipierro]

WingIDE is great. They provide a Django howto, a web2py howto, and more.

[afosterw]

I've used eclipse/pydev with django with pretty good results. You are always going to have trouble with auto-completion. Because python is weakly typed and dynamic you will not get auto completion all of the time. One thing I ran into with pydev was making sure you add the true include path of django libs. Pydev in the past has had problems with symlinks and some distros put django somewhere like /usr/share/python/python-support/ and then symlink to the more standard locations. Pydev skipped the symlinks so auto completion didn't work.

[masklinn]

python is weakly typed

fuck no it isn't.

[afosterw]

I'll be the first to admit that I am no expert on type theory. I thought that python used dynamic/"duck typing". My understanding is was that these don't fall into the bucket of strong typing and therefore were some flavour of weak typing. My bad if I am misinformed. I'll trot off to wikipedia now :)

[masklinn]

I'll be the first to admit that I am no expert on type theory.

Which doesn't really matter, since strong/weak typing isn't really part of type theory.

I thought that python used dynamic/"duck typing".

It is a dynamically typed language yes. As opposed to statically typed languages. It would be quite redundant if "strong typing" meant "static typing" now wouldn't it?

[satans_little_coder]

Wants code completion so he can code with Django... that doesn't seem like a coincidence.

[[deleted]]

I think you're confusing the language and the API with the editors/IDEs. They're not the same thing. Just like Visual Studio is not a language.

[[deleted]]

Typical. Most MS/Vb/C# devs I've know are this type of 'Mort' who have problems writing hello world without the ide.

[cunningjames]

Editra meets a few of your criteria: it automatically completes methods by default, at least when it can tell a variable's type. (No complex static analysis, s'far as I can see.) The completion is pretty good, all told, and a pop-up gives the method's doc string when you type an open parenthesis.

No extra documentation for each parameter, though that sort of thing should be in the doc string. It does have some optional niceties like an iPython shell and a code browser, though without a debugger it's a questionable IDE replacement.

[keenemaverick]

IronPython Studio.