[SciPy-user] Debug console - Re: Pros and Cons of Python verses other array environments

[Bill Baxter]

On 9/29/06, Ryan May <rmay at ou.edu> wrote:
> Bill Baxter wrote:
> > 2) integration of debugging is not as good as matlab.  In matlab when
> > you stop at a breakpoint in your code, you get an interactive console
> > where you can probe current values in your program, or create new ones
> > etc.  The Wing IDE has this, but I couldn't find any open source IDEs
> > that did this.
> >
> You might try the Eric IDE:
> http://www.die-offenbachs.de/detlev/eric3.html
>
> The GUI is a little complicated/full, but now that I've started to get
> the hang of it, I really like it.  Instead of a console, it gives you a
> list of locals and globals while in debug mode.

Thanks.  A number of free IDEs provied a list of watch variables or
locals&globals (Wing included).  But a list of variables isn't quite
the same as being able to interactively test out functions and
expressions on the values in question.  That's what the debug console
is great for.  Oops! Got an error.  Bad syntax, huh?  Hmm, is this
right? No, what about this?  Nope.  This? yeh that's it!  Ok great.
Fix code.  Rerun.

I think the PyDev eclipse plugin actually has this now, but didn't
when I was shopping around.  Either way, Eclipse has a pretty steep
learning curve.

Anyway, I went ahead and bought a license for Wing.  I think it was
well worth it.  Far cheaper than a license for Matlab, anyway.  :-)
The only thing it seems to lack that I would expect from a commercial
IDE is tooltips to show the values of variables.

--bb