The editor is the main tool of a programmer.
Here we list the most common Python editors.
| editor | description |
|---|---|
| IDLE | default basic Python editor |
| IPython | powerful interactive environment |
| Spyder | Anaconda IDE with interactive debugger |
| Jupyter | great for integrating output, text and diagrams |
| Sublime2 | many plugins, powerful key commands |
| Atom | like Sublime, but 100% Open Source |
| Pycharm | lots of functionality for writing big programs |
| Notepad++ | good general-purpose text editor on Windows |
| Vim | works through SSH |
Standard editor in Python distributions, easy to use but very basic.
Spyder is part of the Anaconda Python distribution. It is a small IDE mostly for data analysis, similar to RStudio. It automatically highlights Syntax errors, contains a variable explorer, debugging functionality and other useful things.
A more sophisticated interactive Python command line. It incorporates tab-completion, interactive help and regular shell commands. Also look up the %-magic commands.
Interactive environment for the web browser. A Jupyter notebook contains Python code, text, images and any output from your program (including plots!). It is a great tool for exploratory data analysis.
A general-purpose text editor that works on all systems. There are many plugins for Python available. There is a free and a commercial version available.
The Open Source cousin of Sublime2. It has great GitHub integration.
PyCharm is probably the most luxurious IDE for Python. It contains tons of functions that are a superset of all the above. PyCharm is a great choice for bigger Python projects.
If you must use a text editor on Windows to edit files, use Notepad++. DO NOT USE THE WINDOWS NOTEPAD
To use Vim, you need to learn a lot of keyboard shortcuts. Its unique advantage is that it is the only editor in this collection that you can use through an SSH connection on a remote machine.