Modern Python Projects Transcripts
Chapter: Your code editor
Lecture: Choosing a code editor
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Let's start this course by discussing one of the essential tools that every programmer uses.
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A code editor. No matter what kind of tools and work flows you use when
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building a new Python application, you will still spend most of your time inside the code editor. It's a very sensitive topic for many programmers.
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There's even this famous comic stripe by XKCD, where different programmers argue. What's a code editor for real
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Programmers? Don't take it too seriously and use whatever code editor you find comfortable. I, for example, really like VSCode.
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Since this a Python course, you might be wondering, Why am I not using PyCharm, as many Python programmers do? Well,
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there's absolutely nothing wrong with PyCharm. It's an excellent code editor for both beginners and Advanced Python programmers.
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I have not used it personally, but I watched some tutorials where the instructors were using PyCharm,
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and from what I saw, it works great out of the books. It has a much better refactoring capabilities in VSCode,
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and you really can't go wrong by sticking with it. There is a free community version, and there is a paid version that offers more features,
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but the free version is perfectly capable to get you started. But the chances are that maybe Python is not your only programming language,
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and you need a more versatile code editor. Maybe you want to be able to customize more things. Or maybe you would prefer your code.
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Editor To be Open Source. There are many different code editors out there. Stack Overflow creates a survey every year. Let's take a look. In 2017,
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the most popular Code editor was visual studio. Then we had note pad plus plus, sublime text, vim and then visual studio code.
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As you can see, this survey is not limited to Pyton programmers. There is PHP Storm or Android studio,
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so the results are from programmers working in any kind of programming language. So that was 2017. In 2018,
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you can see that there are three code editors that are equally popular visual studio code visual studio and note pad plus plus,
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let's check the next year. In 2019, visual studio code really dominated this survey. Over 50% off responders are using it.
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And what about 2020 Well we don't know, because in the survey from 2020 there was no question about your favorite code editor,
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So I can't really tell if VSCode still that popular. But I think it still is. There was no new code editor that would get so popular.
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VSCode. And if you really want to customize every possible little detail of code editor or you want a code editor that works in your terminal,
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then there are editors like Vim or Emacs. Those are text editors, not IDE’s, although some people joke that Emacs is a whole operating system.
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But when you install some plugins, you can turn them into a pretty capable code. Editors. The learning curve for both of them is very steep.
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They don't take you by the hand and show you how to use it. You don't configure them by clicking things in the interface,
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but you modify a configuration file, so you need to first check the documentation of what's possible.
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But thanks to that they offer an incredible level of customization. You can change basically any part of it.
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For example, here is a Vim configuration that I use, and I swear I try to keep it to a minimum, but it's still almost 250 lines long.
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I usually use Vim for very quick edits in a terminal because it's very fast to use it that way. I don't have to contact switch to a separate up.
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I just run my edits in the terminal and then continue with what I was doing before from all those code editors that I mentioned. VSCode is my favorite.
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I've been using it for a few years, and it works pretty well for Python and for any other programming language today I am.
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Using, what I really like about VSCode is that it strikes the right balance between productivity and Beginner friendliness.
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When you install it, you can start using it right away. And as you go, it will try to suggest some plugins and settings that
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you might want to use. Open your first Python file and it will suggest, Python extension. When you continue editing that file,
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it will suggest to install a Linter and a formatter. On top of that, there is a very vibrant community around it.
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Every month, a new version is released, and it usually brings a ton of new features. So, in this chapter,
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I will show you how to install and set up VSCode for programming in Python. I will start from a completely new installation of VSCode and then
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set up everything from scratch. I will show you some of the most popular features but also some less popular ones that maybe you never heard about.
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If you don't use VSCode and you are not planning to use it, feel free to skip this chapter and jump to the next one.