New to python, do I need an IDE or is vim still good enough?

[Roy Smith]

Monte Milanuk <memilanuk at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Maybe its because I'm still just a hobbyist when it comes to coding, but I
> > spend far more time 'thinking' about what I'm doing than typing things in...

If more "professional" programmers spent more time thinking and less 
type typing, the world would be a better place.  Keep doing what you're 
doing.  Really. 

Chris Angelico <rosuav at gmail.com> wrote:
[regarding 
> Bracket matching
> Language-sensitive auto-indentation
> and automatically indents

Yeah, what he said, plus syntax coloring.  And keyword highlighting.  
And autocompletion of variable names.

And parsing of error messages.

I'll pause a moment to let that sink in.  Grok the fullness of just how 
awesome a feature it is.

In emacs, for example. I'll do C-C M (which I have bound to M-X 
Compile).  This runs a command and captures the output in a buffer.  If 
the output happens to contain something like:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File 
"/home/roy/production/python/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/nose/case.
py", line 197, in runTest
    self.test(*self.arg)
  File "/home/roy/songza/api2/test_api2.py", line 16, in test_get_api
    data = requests.get(url('api/v2/')).json
  File "/home/roy/songza/api2/test_common.py", line 13, in url
    assert route.startswith('/')
AssertionError

emacs will parse that, highlight the filenames and line numbers and if I 
type M-`, it'll take me to the line of the next error (including opening 
the file if it's not already open).

I assume other smart editors have similar capabilities.  Different tools 
have different combinations of these, or slightly different 
implementations.  Find one you like and learn all of it's capabilities.  
It makes a huge difference in how productive you are.