How can I get/save Pandas DataFrame help content?

[Steven D'Aprano]

On Thursday 17 December 2015 13:48, Robert wrote:

> Hi,
> 
> When I use Enthought/Canopy, help(DataFrame) has so much content that it
> exceeds the display buffer, i.e. its head is cut off as I go up to see it.


Step 1: report this as a bug to Enthought and/or the Python bug tracker. 
help(DataFrame) should automatically choose a pager such as `less` on Linux 
or equivalent (`more` I think?) on Windows.

Step 2: in the meantime, while you wait for Enthought to fix this, you can 
try any of these:

(a) open the regular Python interactive interpreter (do you need help with 
that?);  once you have the >>> prompt, import the module that DataFrame 
comes from, then run help:


    import whatever
    help(whatever.DataFrame)


The regular interactive interpreter ought to automatically pick a pager. If 
it doesn't, that's a bug.


(b) At the shell prompt (most likely a $ or # prompt) run:

    pydoc whatever.DataFrame

if necessarily piping it to the pager or file of your choice using your 
shell's normal redirection syntax, e.g.:

    pydoc whatever.DataFrame | less


(Remember, this is at the shell $ prompt, not the Python >>> prompt.)


(c) If your OS can't find "pydoc", try this instead:

    python -m pydoc whatever.DataFrame





-- 
Steve