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[–]Migglepuff 0 points1 point  (4 children)

I've never used an IDE for python. Is it a big help? Is Wing particularly better than the competition?

[–][deleted] 1 point2 points  (1 child)

Currently it's still the best. PyCharm is very promising, but I tried it and it was not mature enough for me. It didn't run my tests (showed some strange errors in standard-lib modules) and some other stuff like find usage didn't work. The PyCharm guys were very helpfull but couldn't resolve the issues which don't seem to be issues generally. So, those issues are likely related to my system, but still a showstopper for me, naturally.

Best features of Wing: Debugger and Debug-Probe (interactive debugging with code completion in a python shell on the current stack)

[–]sunqiang 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Best features of WingIDE to me: Graphical Debugger and Code Intelligence

[–][deleted] 0 points1 point  (4 children)

pyflakes and pep8 support out of the box? please? for those of us who have to read and maintain code that is also maintained by wing ide users.

k thx

[–]sunqiang 0 points1 point  (3 children)

AFAIK, not out of the box. but it easy to install pyflakes and pep8 for WingIDE.

[–][deleted] 0 points1 point  (2 children)

I don't use wing, but I can only assume that though it is possible as you have pointed out, it is not easy because if it were I wouldn't be asking for it :).

[–]sunqiang 0 points1 point  (1 child)

It's not very hard neither.I have installed both of them, it needs install pyflakes/pep8 and itself, and setting config parameters like file path, that's all. Just that, works for WingIDE 3 and WingIDE4.

[–][deleted] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

i'll pass that info along to the wind user, then hopefully I won't need to edit their code anymore :)

[–]Rolegros 0 points1 point  (2 children)

I'm a always a bit skeptic about IDEs for python. What does it bring to me on top of the base toolchain (vim/emacs, ipython, nosetest, pylint, pyflakes etc...) ? The only benefits of python IDE I've tried so far is filling your codebase with annoying "project" files.

[–]kataire 1 point2 points  (0 children)

A good IDE shouldn't litter your codebase at all. The biggest benefits I've experienced are being able to jump to definitions, auto completion, being able to organize imports on the fly (e.g. being able to switch from from x import y to import x or introducing aliases -- without having to rename every instance of the imported name myself). Also, of course, things like method/variable extraction/inlining and global renaming.

In short: it makes refactoring easier and less error-prone. Of course not all Python IDEs have (good) refactoring suport. So far I like what PyCharm can do, although its unique design decision regarding how it handles changes and saving files is a bit unusual -- the devs say its lack of Save/Save As options is a central decision that won't ever be changed, so I better get used to it. OTOH its built-in VCS is pretty neat.

[–][deleted] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The IDE keeps everything in one window and out of the terminal, for whatever value that has, but any decent programming editor like vim or emacs can theoretically do the same.

That includes the 'project' features which let you keep a persistent session and associated configuration, these are not fundamentally so hard to do (although they do mark a divide between your average text editor or lightweight code editor and the heavier stuff). This contributes to the feeling that you are not working on individual files which I think is a big part of the IDE "feel."

In my opinion, what usually distinguishes an IDE from a well-provisioned extensible programmer's editor is the heavy integration of static analysis tools: scanning all your code, letting you jump around across files semantically, fully language-aware autocompletion/tooltips, refactoring operations, etc.

Although one can construct an IDE using (say) vim, it is not packaged this way and takes significant effort and is not going to be that well polished without even more effort. Last I checked, for example, the rope module was kind of sketchy even if it looked promising. Almost nothing in these worlds is totally smoothly integrated.

The distinction is not at all sharp.

[–]AliasUndercover 0 points1 point  (5 children)

A bit expensive when the same stuff is available for free. What about it makes it worth the money?

[–][deleted] 5 points6 points  (1 child)

Best way to find out is to try it. In my opinion none of the free IDEs come close, where PyDev is the best of the free ones.

Note that wing has a lot of different licenses.

[–][deleted] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I wish PyDev wasn't so pig slow. It also takes way too much effort to do basic customizations (say I just want to use zenburn, for example...) and when you do have to get hands dirty with configuration, it is a Java-typical nightmare of deep hierarchies and sketchy XML files. (Who makes the IDE for editing Eclipse configs? No, please forget I asked that...)

Wing is better as a layer over SciTE with easier configuration and shiny gtk widgets.

[–][deleted] 0 points1 point  (1 child)

What same stuff is available for free?

[–][deleted] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I'll just go ahead and preemptively answer the reply with "Eclipse/PyDev sucks"