vsbabu.org

Pythoning with Eclipse

Today, I tried pyeclipse plugin for Eclipse IDE. I wanted to force myself to use some IDE.

Eclipse is pretty good. Here are my random thoughts on the whole experience.

• + Great GUI. Doesn’t get in your way.
• + Very good CVS integration.
• + Very well documented.
• + Editor is decent. Python still doesn’t get auto-completion in this, but for Java, it works very nicely.
• + Perspectives took some time to understand. But once used, it seemed very logical.
• - Eclipse is a huge download.
• - Ctrl-F11 to run the last run module is ok, but I couldn’t find any shortcut to just run the current buffer.
• - I generally use IDE’s only when GUI design is involved. Eclipse doesn’t provide any form builder wizard. I guess it can be added in because Eclipse is an extensible platform.

1. I was blown away by Eclipse's CVS integration, but unexpectedly disappointed by its lack of Python syntax highlighting. I reckon that CVS integration might drag me back, though. Niiiice!

   Posted by: Garth T Kidd on February 13, 2003 08:42 PM

2. pyeclipse plugin does syntax highlighting for Python source. I'm too much used to PythonWin's auto-complete though.

   Posted by: Babu on February 13, 2003 10:02 PM

3. No matter how full of bells and whistles the IDE is, I always find myself using vim again after a couple of days. I'm just one of those people for whom the unix philosophy works best rather than putting everything in one big package.

   Posted by: Andy Todd on February 14, 2003 03:47 AM

4. Have to agree with Mr Todd - I'm a comfortable vim user, and various work-time experiences with MS Visual Studio and just about anything written in Java seem to involve bloated all-in-one interfaces with annoying panels; and the lights all dim across town when one presses any of the magic function keys.

   If Eclipse actually integrates properly with CVS, then that's a start, though. Most IDEs seem to force you to add your module files manually - what the ____ did they think you were doing when checking stuff out?

   Posted by: Paul Boddie on February 14, 2003 09:32 AM

5. Python Wiki has good details on using Eclipse with Python:

   http://www.python.org/cgi-bin/moinmoin/EclipsePythonIntegration

   Posted by: Babu on May 29, 2003 06:56 AM

6. Thanks for the link babu. You beat google this time.

   Posted by: uberdog on July 9, 2003 07:01 PM

7. I may want to try some other Eclipse plugins for Python. As for me, I tried several python plugins like pyeclipse, pydev or epic, but then came to trustudio IDE. It's probably the best eclipse-based IDE for python at the moment.

   Posted by: Kenny Naft on September 19, 2004 04:39 AM