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1 1 =================
2 2 IPython reference
3 3 =================
4 4
5 5 .. _command_line_options:
6 6
7 7 Command-line usage
8 8 ==================
9 9
10 10 You start IPython with the command::
11 11
12 12 $ ipython [options] files
13 13
14 14 If invoked with no options, it executes all the files listed in sequence
15 15 and drops you into the interpreter while still acknowledging any options
16 16 you may have set in your ipython_config.py. This behavior is different from
17 17 standard Python, which when called as python -i will only execute one
18 18 file and ignore your configuration setup.
19 19
20 20 Please note that some of the configuration options are not available at
21 21 the command line, simply because they are not practical here. Look into
22 22 your configuration files for details on those. There are separate configuration
23 23 files for each profile, and the files look like :file:`ipython_config.py` or
24 24 :file:`ipython_config_{frontendname}.py`. Profile directories look like
25 25 :file:`profile_{profilename}` and are typically installed in the :envvar:`IPYTHONDIR` directory,
26 26 which defaults to :file:`$HOME/.ipython`. For Windows users, :envvar:`HOME`
27 27 resolves to :file:`C:\\Users\\{YourUserName}` in most instances.
28 28
29 29 Command-line Options
30 30 --------------------
31 31
32 32 To see the options IPython accepts, use ``ipython --help`` (and you probably
33 33 should run the output through a pager such as ``ipython --help | less`` for
34 34 more convenient reading). This shows all the options that have a single-word
35 35 alias to control them, but IPython lets you configure all of its objects from
36 36 the command-line by passing the full class name and a corresponding value; type
37 37 ``ipython --help-all`` to see this full list. For example::
38 38
39 39 ipython --matplotlib qt
40 40
41 41 is equivalent to::
42 42
43 43 ipython --TerminalIPythonApp.matplotlib='qt'
44 44
45 45 Note that in the second form, you *must* use the equal sign, as the expression
46 46 is evaluated as an actual Python assignment. While in the above example the
47 47 short form is more convenient, only the most common options have a short form,
48 48 while any configurable variable in IPython can be set at the command-line by
49 49 using the long form. This long form is the same syntax used in the
50 50 configuration files, if you want to set these options permanently.
51 51
52 52
53 53 Interactive use
54 54 ===============
55 55
56 56 IPython is meant to work as a drop-in replacement for the standard interactive
57 57 interpreter. As such, any code which is valid python should execute normally
58 58 under IPython (cases where this is not true should be reported as bugs). It
59 59 does, however, offer many features which are not available at a standard python
60 60 prompt. What follows is a list of these.
61 61
62 62
63 63 Caution for Windows users
64 64 -------------------------
65 65
66 66 Windows, unfortunately, uses the '\\' character as a path separator. This is a
67 67 terrible choice, because '\\' also represents the escape character in most
68 68 modern programming languages, including Python. For this reason, using '/'
69 69 character is recommended if you have problems with ``\``. However, in Windows
70 70 commands '/' flags options, so you can not use it for the root directory. This
71 71 means that paths beginning at the root must be typed in a contrived manner
72 72 like: ``%copy \opt/foo/bar.txt \tmp``
73 73
74 74 .. _magic:
75 75
76 76 Magic command system
77 77 --------------------
78 78
79 79 IPython will treat any line whose first character is a % as a special
80 80 call to a 'magic' function. These allow you to control the behavior of
81 81 IPython itself, plus a lot of system-type features. They are all
82 82 prefixed with a % character, but parameters are given without
83 83 parentheses or quotes.
84 84
85 85 Lines that begin with ``%%`` signal a *cell magic*: they take as arguments not
86 86 only the rest of the current line, but all lines below them as well, in the
87 87 current execution block. Cell magics can in fact make arbitrary modifications
88 88 to the input they receive, which need not even be valid Python code at all.
89 89 They receive the whole block as a single string.
90 90
91 91 As a line magic example, the ``%cd`` magic works just like the OS command of
92 92 the same name::
93 93
94 94 In [8]: %cd
95 95 /home/fperez
96 96
97 97 The following uses the builtin ``timeit`` in cell mode::
98 98
99 99 In [10]: %%timeit x = range(10000)
100 100 ...: min(x)
101 101 ...: max(x)
102 102 ...:
103 103 1000 loops, best of 3: 438 us per loop
104 104
105 105 In this case, ``x = range(10000)`` is called as the line argument, and the
106 106 block with ``min(x)`` and ``max(x)`` is called as the cell body. The
107 107 ``timeit`` magic receives both.
108 108
109 109 If you have 'automagic' enabled (as it by default), you don't need to type in
110 110 the single ``%`` explicitly for line magics; IPython will scan its internal
111 111 list of magic functions and call one if it exists. With automagic on you can
112 112 then just type ``cd mydir`` to go to directory 'mydir'::
113 113
114 114 In [9]: cd mydir
115 115 /home/fperez/mydir
116 116
117 117 Note that cell magics *always* require an explicit ``%%`` prefix, automagic
118 118 calling only works for line magics.
119 119
120 120 The automagic system has the lowest possible precedence in name searches, so
121 121 you can freely use variables with the same names as magic commands. If a magic
122 122 command is 'shadowed' by a variable, you will need the explicit ``%`` prefix to
123 123 use it:
124 124
125 125 .. sourcecode:: ipython
126 126
127 127 In [1]: cd ipython # %cd is called by automagic
128 128 /home/fperez/ipython
129 129
130 130 In [2]: cd=1 # now cd is just a variable
131 131
132 132 In [3]: cd .. # and doesn't work as a function anymore
133 133 File "<ipython-input-3-9fedb3aff56c>", line 1
134 134 cd ..
135 135 ^
136 136 SyntaxError: invalid syntax
137 137
138 138
139 139 In [4]: %cd .. # but %cd always works
140 140 /home/fperez
141 141
142 142 In [5]: del cd # if you remove the cd variable, automagic works again
143 143
144 144 In [6]: cd ipython
145 145
146 146 /home/fperez/ipython
147 147
148 148 .. _defining_magics:
149 149
150 150 Defining your own magics
151 151 ++++++++++++++++++++++++
152 152
153 153 There are two main ways to define your own magic functions: from standalone
154 154 functions and by inheriting from a base class provided by IPython:
155 155 :class:`IPython.core.magic.Magics`. Below we show code you can place in a file
156 156 that you load from your configuration, such as any file in the ``startup``
157 157 subdirectory of your default IPython profile.
158 158
159 159 First, let us see the simplest case. The following shows how to create a line
160 160 magic, a cell one and one that works in both modes, using just plain functions:
161 161
162 162 .. sourcecode:: python
163 163
164 164 from IPython.core.magic import (register_line_magic, register_cell_magic,
165 165 register_line_cell_magic)
166 166
167 167 @register_line_magic
168 168 def lmagic(line):
169 169 "my line magic"
170 170 return line
171 171
172 172 @register_cell_magic
173 173 def cmagic(line, cell):
174 174 "my cell magic"
175 175 return line, cell
176 176
177 177 @register_line_cell_magic
178 178 def lcmagic(line, cell=None):
179 179 "Magic that works both as %lcmagic and as %%lcmagic"
180 180 if cell is None:
181 181 print("Called as line magic")
182 182 return line
183 183 else:
184 184 print("Called as cell magic")
185 185 return line, cell
186 186
187 187 # We delete these to avoid name conflicts for automagic to work
188 188 del lmagic, lcmagic
189 189
190 190
191 191 You can also create magics of all three kinds by inheriting from the
192 192 :class:`IPython.core.magic.Magics` class. This lets you create magics that can
193 193 potentially hold state in between calls, and that have full access to the main
194 194 IPython object:
195 195
196 196 .. sourcecode:: python
197 197
198 198 # This code can be put in any Python module, it does not require IPython
199 199 # itself to be running already. It only creates the magics subclass but
200 200 # doesn't instantiate it yet.
201 201 from __future__ import print_function
202 202 from IPython.core.magic import (Magics, magics_class, line_magic,
203 203 cell_magic, line_cell_magic)
204 204
205 205 # The class MUST call this class decorator at creation time
206 206 @magics_class
207 207 class MyMagics(Magics):
208 208
209 209 @line_magic
210 210 def lmagic(self, line):
211 211 "my line magic"
212 212 print("Full access to the main IPython object:", self.shell)
213 213 print("Variables in the user namespace:", list(self.shell.user_ns.keys()))
214 214 return line
215 215
216 216 @cell_magic
217 217 def cmagic(self, line, cell):
218 218 "my cell magic"
219 219 return line, cell
220 220
221 221 @line_cell_magic
222 222 def lcmagic(self, line, cell=None):
223 223 "Magic that works both as %lcmagic and as %%lcmagic"
224 224 if cell is None:
225 225 print("Called as line magic")
226 226 return line
227 227 else:
228 228 print("Called as cell magic")
229 229 return line, cell
230 230
231 231
232 232 # In order to actually use these magics, you must register them with a
233 233 # running IPython. This code must be placed in a file that is loaded once
234 234 # IPython is up and running:
235 235 ip = get_ipython()
236 236 # You can register the class itself without instantiating it. IPython will
237 237 # call the default constructor on it.
238 238 ip.register_magics(MyMagics)
239 239
240 240 If you want to create a class with a different constructor that holds
241 241 additional state, then you should always call the parent constructor and
242 242 instantiate the class yourself before registration:
243 243
244 244 .. sourcecode:: python
245 245
246 246 @magics_class
247 247 class StatefulMagics(Magics):
248 248 "Magics that hold additional state"
249 249
250 250 def __init__(self, shell, data):
251 251 # You must call the parent constructor
252 252 super(StatefulMagics, self).__init__(shell)
253 253 self.data = data
254 254
255 255 # etc...
256 256
257 257 # This class must then be registered with a manually created instance,
258 258 # since its constructor has different arguments from the default:
259 259 ip = get_ipython()
260 260 magics = StatefulMagics(ip, some_data)
261 261 ip.register_magics(magics)
262 262
263 263
264 264 In earlier versions, IPython had an API for the creation of line magics (cell
265 265 magics did not exist at the time) that required you to create functions with a
266 266 method-looking signature and to manually pass both the function and the name.
267 267 While this API is no longer recommended, it remains indefinitely supported for
268 268 backwards compatibility purposes. With the old API, you'd create a magic as
269 269 follows:
270 270
271 271 .. sourcecode:: python
272 272
273 273 def func(self, line):
274 274 print("Line magic called with line:", line)
275 275 print("IPython object:", self.shell)
276 276
277 277 ip = get_ipython()
278 278 # Declare this function as the magic %mycommand
279 279 ip.define_magic('mycommand', func)
280 280
281 281 Type ``%magic`` for more information, including a list of all available magic
282 282 functions at any time and their docstrings. You can also type
283 283 ``%magic_function_name?`` (see :ref:`below <dynamic_object_info>` for
284 284 information on the '?' system) to get information about any particular magic
285 285 function you are interested in.
286 286
287 287 The API documentation for the :mod:`IPython.core.magic` module contains the full
288 288 docstrings of all currently available magic commands.
289 289
290 290
291 291 Access to the standard Python help
292 292 ----------------------------------
293 293
294 294 Simply type ``help()`` to access Python's standard help system. You can
295 295 also type ``help(object)`` for information about a given object, or
296 296 ``help('keyword')`` for information on a keyword. You may need to configure your
297 297 PYTHONDOCS environment variable for this feature to work correctly.
298 298
299 299 .. _dynamic_object_info:
300 300
301 301 Dynamic object information
302 302 --------------------------
303 303
304 304 Typing ``?word`` or ``word?`` prints detailed information about an object. If
305 305 certain strings in the object are too long (e.g. function signatures) they get
306 306 snipped in the center for brevity. This system gives access variable types and
307 307 values, docstrings, function prototypes and other useful information.
308 308
309 309 If the information will not fit in the terminal, it is displayed in a pager
310 310 (``less`` if available, otherwise a basic internal pager).
311 311
312 312 Typing ``??word`` or ``word??`` gives access to the full information, including
313 313 the source code where possible. Long strings are not snipped.
314 314
315 315 The following magic functions are particularly useful for gathering
316 316 information about your working environment. You can get more details by
317 317 typing ``%magic`` or querying them individually (``%function_name?``);
318 318 this is just a summary:
319 319
320 320 * **%pdoc <object>**: Print (or run through a pager if too long) the
321 321 docstring for an object. If the given object is a class, it will
322 322 print both the class and the constructor docstrings.
323 323 * **%pdef <object>**: Print the call signature for any callable
324 324 object. If the object is a class, print the constructor information.
325 325 * **%psource <object>**: Print (or run through a pager if too long)
326 326 the source code for an object.
327 327 * **%pfile <object>**: Show the entire source file where an object was
328 328 defined via a pager, opening it at the line where the object
329 329 definition begins.
330 330 * **%who/%whos**: These functions give information about identifiers
331 331 you have defined interactively (not things you loaded or defined
332 332 in your configuration files). %who just prints a list of
333 333 identifiers and %whos prints a table with some basic details about
334 334 each identifier.
335 335
336 336 Note that the dynamic object information functions (?/??, ``%pdoc``,
337 337 ``%pfile``, ``%pdef``, ``%psource``) work on object attributes, as well as
338 338 directly on variables. For example, after doing ``import os``, you can use
339 339 ``os.path.abspath??``.
340 340
341 341 .. _readline:
342 342
343 343 Readline-based features
344 344 -----------------------
345 345
346 346 These features require the GNU readline library, so they won't work if your
347 347 Python installation lacks readline support. We will first describe the default
348 348 behavior IPython uses, and then how to change it to suit your preferences.
349 349
350 350
351 351 Command line completion
352 352 +++++++++++++++++++++++
353 353
354 354 At any time, hitting TAB will complete any available python commands or
355 355 variable names, and show you a list of the possible completions if
356 356 there's no unambiguous one. It will also complete filenames in the
357 357 current directory if no python names match what you've typed so far.
358 358
359 359
360 360 Search command history
361 361 ++++++++++++++++++++++
362 362
363 363 IPython provides two ways for searching through previous input and thus
364 364 reduce the need for repetitive typing:
365 365
366 366 1. Start typing, and then use the up and down arrow keys (or :kbd:`Ctrl-p`
367 367 and :kbd:`Ctrl-n`) to search through only the history items that match
368 368 what you've typed so far.
369 369 2. Hit :kbd:`Ctrl-r`: to open a search prompt. Begin typing and the system
370 370 searches your history for lines that contain what you've typed so
371 371 far, completing as much as it can.
372 372
373 373 IPython will save your input history when it leaves and reload it next
374 374 time you restart it. By default, the history file is named
375 375 :file:`.ipython/profile_{name}/history.sqlite`.
376 376
377 377 Autoindent
378 378 ++++++++++
379 379
380 380 IPython can recognize lines ending in ':' and indent the next line,
381 381 while also un-indenting automatically after 'raise' or 'return'.
382 382
383 383 This feature uses the readline library, so it will honor your
384 384 :file:`~/.inputrc` configuration (or whatever file your :envvar:`INPUTRC` environment variable points
385 385 to). Adding the following lines to your :file:`.inputrc` file can make
386 386 indenting/unindenting more convenient (M-i indents, M-u unindents)::
387 387
388 388 # if you don't already have a ~/.inputrc file, you need this include:
389 389 $include /etc/inputrc
390 390
391 391 $if Python
392 392 "\M-i": " "
393 393 "\M-u": "\d\d\d\d"
394 394 $endif
395 395
396 396 Note that there are 4 spaces between the quote marks after "M-i" above.
397 397
398 398 .. warning::
399 399
400 400 Setting the above indents will cause problems with unicode text entry in
401 401 the terminal.
402 402
403 403 .. warning::
404 404
405 405 Autoindent is ON by default, but it can cause problems with the pasting of
406 406 multi-line indented code (the pasted code gets re-indented on each line). A
407 407 magic function %autoindent allows you to toggle it on/off at runtime. You
408 408 can also disable it permanently on in your :file:`ipython_config.py` file
409 409 (set TerminalInteractiveShell.autoindent=False).
410 410
411 411 If you want to paste multiple lines in the terminal, it is recommended that
412 412 you use ``%paste``.
413 413
414 414
415 415 Customizing readline behavior
416 416 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
417 417
418 418 All these features are based on the GNU readline library, which has an
419 419 extremely customizable interface. Normally, readline is configured via a
420 420 :file:`.inputrc` file. IPython respects this, and you can also customise readline
421 421 by setting the following :doc:`configuration </config/intro>` options:
422 422
423 423 * ``InteractiveShell.readline_parse_and_bind``: this holds a list of strings to be executed
424 424 via a readline.parse_and_bind() command. The syntax for valid commands
425 425 of this kind can be found by reading the documentation for the GNU
426 426 readline library, as these commands are of the kind which readline
427 427 accepts in its configuration file.
428 428 * ``InteractiveShell.readline_remove_delims``: a string of characters to be removed
429 429 from the default word-delimiters list used by readline, so that
430 430 completions may be performed on strings which contain them. Do not
431 431 change the default value unless you know what you're doing.
432 432
433 433 You will find the default values in your configuration file.
434 434
435 435
436 436 Session logging and restoring
437 437 -----------------------------
438 438
439 439 You can log all input from a session either by starting IPython with the
440 440 command line switch ``--logfile=foo.py`` (see :ref:`here <command_line_options>`)
441 441 or by activating the logging at any moment with the magic function %logstart.
442 442
443 443 Log files can later be reloaded by running them as scripts and IPython
444 444 will attempt to 'replay' the log by executing all the lines in it, thus
445 445 restoring the state of a previous session. This feature is not quite
446 446 perfect, but can still be useful in many cases.
447 447
448 448 The log files can also be used as a way to have a permanent record of
449 449 any code you wrote while experimenting. Log files are regular text files
450 450 which you can later open in your favorite text editor to extract code or
451 451 to 'clean them up' before using them to replay a session.
452 452
453 453 The `%logstart` function for activating logging in mid-session is used as
454 454 follows::
455 455
456 456 %logstart [log_name [log_mode]]
457 457
458 458 If no name is given, it defaults to a file named 'ipython_log.py' in your
459 459 current working directory, in 'rotate' mode (see below).
460 460
461 461 '%logstart name' saves to file 'name' in 'backup' mode. It saves your
462 462 history up to that point and then continues logging.
463 463
464 464 %logstart takes a second optional parameter: logging mode. This can be
465 465 one of (note that the modes are given unquoted):
466 466
467 467 * [over:] overwrite existing log_name.
468 468 * [backup:] rename (if exists) to log_name~ and start log_name.
469 469 * [append:] well, that says it.
470 470 * [rotate:] create rotating logs log_name.1~, log_name.2~, etc.
471 471
472 472 The %logoff and %logon functions allow you to temporarily stop and
473 473 resume logging to a file which had previously been started with
474 474 %logstart. They will fail (with an explanation) if you try to use them
475 475 before logging has been started.
476 476
477 477 .. _system_shell_access:
478 478
479 479 System shell access
480 480 -------------------
481 481
482 482 Any input line beginning with a ! character is passed verbatim (minus
483 483 the !, of course) to the underlying operating system. For example,
484 484 typing ``!ls`` will run 'ls' in the current directory.
485 485
486 486 Manual capture of command output
487 487 --------------------------------
488 488
489 489 You can assign the result of a system command to a Python variable with the
490 490 syntax ``myfiles = !ls``. This gets machine readable output from stdout
491 491 (e.g. without colours), and splits on newlines. To explicitly get this sort of
492 492 output without assigning to a variable, use two exclamation marks (``!!ls``) or
493 493 the ``%sx`` magic command.
494 494
495 495 The captured list has some convenience features. ``myfiles.n`` or ``myfiles.s``
496 496 returns a string delimited by newlines or spaces, respectively. ``myfiles.p``
497 497 produces `path objects <http://pypi.python.org/pypi/path.py>`_ from the list items.
498 498 See :ref:`string_lists` for details.
499 499
500 500 IPython also allows you to expand the value of python variables when
501 501 making system calls. Wrap variables or expressions in {braces}::
502 502
503 503 In [1]: pyvar = 'Hello world'
504 504 In [2]: !echo "A python variable: {pyvar}"
505 505 A python variable: Hello world
506 506 In [3]: import math
507 507 In [4]: x = 8
508 508 In [5]: !echo {math.factorial(x)}
509 509 40320
510 510
511 511 For simple cases, you can alternatively prepend $ to a variable name::
512 512
513 513 In [6]: !echo $sys.argv
514 514 [/home/fperez/usr/bin/ipython]
515 515 In [7]: !echo "A system variable: $$HOME" # Use $$ for literal $
516 516 A system variable: /home/fperez
517 517
518 518 System command aliases
519 519 ----------------------
520 520
521 521 The %alias magic function allows you to define magic functions which are in fact
522 522 system shell commands. These aliases can have parameters.
523 523
524 524 ``%alias alias_name cmd`` defines 'alias_name' as an alias for 'cmd'
525 525
526 526 Then, typing ``alias_name params`` will execute the system command 'cmd
527 527 params' (from your underlying operating system).
528 528
529 529 You can also define aliases with parameters using %s specifiers (one per
530 530 parameter). The following example defines the parts function as an
531 531 alias to the command 'echo first %s second %s' where each %s will be
532 532 replaced by a positional parameter to the call to %parts::
533 533
534 534 In [1]: %alias parts echo first %s second %s
535 535 In [2]: parts A B
536 536 first A second B
537 537 In [3]: parts A
538 538 ERROR: Alias <parts> requires 2 arguments, 1 given.
539 539
540 540 If called with no parameters, %alias prints the table of currently
541 541 defined aliases.
542 542
543 543 The %rehashx magic allows you to load your entire $PATH as
544 544 ipython aliases. See its docstring for further details.
545 545
546 546
547 547 .. _dreload:
548 548
549 549 Recursive reload
550 550 ----------------
551 551
552 552 The :mod:`IPython.lib.deepreload` module allows you to recursively reload a
553 553 module: changes made to any of its dependencies will be reloaded without
554 554 having to exit. To start using it, do::
555 555
556 556 from IPython.lib.deepreload import reload as dreload
557 557
558 558
559 559 Verbose and colored exception traceback printouts
560 560 -------------------------------------------------
561 561
562 562 IPython provides the option to see very detailed exception tracebacks,
563 563 which can be especially useful when debugging large programs. You can
564 564 run any Python file with the %run function to benefit from these
565 565 detailed tracebacks. Furthermore, both normal and verbose tracebacks can
566 566 be colored (if your terminal supports it) which makes them much easier
567 567 to parse visually.
568 568
569 569 See the magic xmode and colors functions for details.
570 570
571 571 These features are basically a terminal version of Ka-Ping Yee's cgitb
572 572 module, now part of the standard Python library.
573 573
574 574
575 575 .. _input_caching:
576 576
577 577 Input caching system
578 578 --------------------
579 579
580 580 IPython offers numbered prompts (In/Out) with input and output caching
581 581 (also referred to as 'input history'). All input is saved and can be
582 582 retrieved as variables (besides the usual arrow key recall), in
583 583 addition to the %rep magic command that brings a history entry
584 584 up for editing on the next command line.
585 585
586 586 The following variables always exist:
587 587
588 588 * _i, _ii, _iii: store previous, next previous and next-next previous inputs.
589 589 * In, _ih : a list of all inputs; _ih[n] is the input from line n. If you
590 590 overwrite In with a variable of your own, you can remake the assignment to the
591 591 internal list with a simple ``In=_ih``.
592 592
593 593 Additionally, global variables named _i<n> are dynamically created (<n>
594 594 being the prompt counter), so ``_i<n> == _ih[<n>] == In[<n>]``.
595 595
596 596 For example, what you typed at prompt 14 is available as ``_i14``, ``_ih[14]``
597 597 and ``In[14]``.
598 598
599 599 This allows you to easily cut and paste multi line interactive prompts
600 600 by printing them out: they print like a clean string, without prompt
601 601 characters. You can also manipulate them like regular variables (they
602 602 are strings), modify or exec them.
603 603
604 604 You can also re-execute multiple lines of input easily by using the
605 605 magic %rerun or %macro functions. The macro system also allows you to re-execute
606 606 previous lines which include magic function calls (which require special
607 607 processing). Type %macro? for more details on the macro system.
608 608
609 609 A history function %hist allows you to see any part of your input
610 610 history by printing a range of the _i variables.
611 611
612 612 You can also search ('grep') through your history by typing
613 613 ``%hist -g somestring``. This is handy for searching for URLs, IP addresses,
614 614 etc. You can bring history entries listed by '%hist -g' up for editing
615 615 with the %recall command, or run them immediately with %rerun.
616 616
617 617 .. _output_caching:
618 618
619 619 Output caching system
620 620 ---------------------
621 621
622 622 For output that is returned from actions, a system similar to the input
623 623 cache exists but using _ instead of _i. Only actions that produce a
624 624 result (NOT assignments, for example) are cached. If you are familiar
625 625 with Mathematica, IPython's _ variables behave exactly like
626 626 Mathematica's % variables.
627 627
628 628 The following variables always exist:
629 629
630 630 * [_] (a single underscore): stores previous output, like Python's
631 631 default interpreter.
632 632 * [__] (two underscores): next previous.
633 633 * [___] (three underscores): next-next previous.
634 634
635 635 Additionally, global variables named _<n> are dynamically created (<n>
636 636 being the prompt counter), such that the result of output <n> is always
637 637 available as _<n> (don't use the angle brackets, just the number, e.g.
638 638 ``_21``).
639 639
640 640 These variables are also stored in a global dictionary (not a
641 641 list, since it only has entries for lines which returned a result)
642 642 available under the names _oh and Out (similar to _ih and In). So the
643 643 output from line 12 can be obtained as ``_12``, ``Out[12]`` or ``_oh[12]``. If you
644 644 accidentally overwrite the Out variable you can recover it by typing
645 645 ``Out=_oh`` at the prompt.
646 646
647 647 This system obviously can potentially put heavy memory demands on your
648 648 system, since it prevents Python's garbage collector from removing any
649 649 previously computed results. You can control how many results are kept
650 650 in memory with the configuration option ``InteractiveShell.cache_size``.
651 651 If you set it to 0, output caching is disabled. You can also use the ``%reset``
652 652 and ``%xdel`` magics to clear large items from memory.
653 653
654 654 Directory history
655 655 -----------------
656 656
657 657 Your history of visited directories is kept in the global list _dh, and
658 658 the magic %cd command can be used to go to any entry in that list. The
659 659 %dhist command allows you to view this history. Do ``cd -<TAB>`` to
660 660 conveniently view the directory history.
661 661
662 662
663 663 Automatic parentheses and quotes
664 664 --------------------------------
665 665
666 666 These features were adapted from Nathan Gray's LazyPython. They are
667 667 meant to allow less typing for common situations.
668 668
669 669 Callable objects (i.e. functions, methods, etc) can be invoked like this
670 670 (notice the commas between the arguments)::
671 671
672 672 In [1]: callable_ob arg1, arg2, arg3
673 673 ------> callable_ob(arg1, arg2, arg3)
674 674
675 675 .. note::
676 676 This feature is disabled by default. To enable it, use the ``%autocall``
677 677 magic command. The commands below with special prefixes will always work,
678 678 however.
679 679
680 680 You can force automatic parentheses by using '/' as the first character
681 681 of a line. For example::
682 682
683 683 In [2]: /globals # becomes 'globals()'
684 684
685 685 Note that the '/' MUST be the first character on the line! This won't work::
686 686
687 687 In [3]: print /globals # syntax error
688 688
689 689 In most cases the automatic algorithm should work, so you should rarely
690 690 need to explicitly invoke /. One notable exception is if you are trying
691 691 to call a function with a list of tuples as arguments (the parenthesis
692 692 will confuse IPython)::
693 693
694 694 In [4]: zip (1,2,3),(4,5,6) # won't work
695 695
696 696 but this will work::
697 697
698 698 In [5]: /zip (1,2,3),(4,5,6)
699 699 ------> zip ((1,2,3),(4,5,6))
700 700 Out[5]: [(1, 4), (2, 5), (3, 6)]
701 701
702 702 IPython tells you that it has altered your command line by displaying
703 703 the new command line preceded by ``--->``.
704 704
705 705 You can force automatic quoting of a function's arguments by using ``,``
706 706 or ``;`` as the first character of a line. For example::
707 707
708 708 In [1]: ,my_function /home/me # becomes my_function("/home/me")
709 709
710 710 If you use ';' the whole argument is quoted as a single string, while ',' splits
711 711 on whitespace::
712 712
713 713 In [2]: ,my_function a b c # becomes my_function("a","b","c")
714 714
715 715 In [3]: ;my_function a b c # becomes my_function("a b c")
716 716
717 717 Note that the ',' or ';' MUST be the first character on the line! This
718 718 won't work::
719 719
720 720 In [4]: x = ,my_function /home/me # syntax error
721 721
722 722 IPython as your default Python environment
723 723 ==========================================
724 724
725 725 Python honors the environment variable :envvar:`PYTHONSTARTUP` and will
726 726 execute at startup the file referenced by this variable. If you put the
727 727 following code at the end of that file, then IPython will be your working
728 728 environment anytime you start Python::
729 729
730 730 import os, IPython
731 731 os.environ['PYTHONSTARTUP'] = '' # Prevent running this again
732 732 IPython.start_ipython()
733 733 raise SystemExit
734 734
735 735 The ``raise SystemExit`` is needed to exit Python when
736 736 it finishes, otherwise you'll be back at the normal Python ``>>>``
737 737 prompt.
738 738
739 739 This is probably useful to developers who manage multiple Python
740 740 versions and don't want to have correspondingly multiple IPython
741 741 versions. Note that in this mode, there is no way to pass IPython any
742 742 command-line options, as those are trapped first by Python itself.
743 743
744 744 .. _Embedding:
745 745
746 746 Embedding IPython
747 747 =================
748 748
749 749 You can start a regular IPython session with
750 750
751 751 .. sourcecode:: python
752 752
753 753 import IPython
754 754 IPython.start_ipython(argv=[])
755 755
756 756 at any point in your program. This will load IPython configuration,
757 757 startup files, and everything, just as if it were a normal IPython session.
758 758
759 759 It is also possible to embed an IPython shell in a namespace in your Python code.
760 760 This allows you to evaluate dynamically the state of your code,
761 761 operate with your variables, analyze them, etc. Note however that
762 762 any changes you make to values while in the shell do not propagate back
763 763 to the running code, so it is safe to modify your values because you
764 764 won't break your code in bizarre ways by doing so.
765 765
766 766 .. note::
767 767
768 768 At present, embedding IPython cannot be done from inside IPython.
769 769 Run the code samples below outside IPython.
770 770
771 771 This feature allows you to easily have a fully functional python
772 772 environment for doing object introspection anywhere in your code with a
773 773 simple function call. In some cases a simple print statement is enough,
774 774 but if you need to do more detailed analysis of a code fragment this
775 775 feature can be very valuable.
776 776
777 777 It can also be useful in scientific computing situations where it is
778 778 common to need to do some automatic, computationally intensive part and
779 779 then stop to look at data, plots, etc.
780 780 Opening an IPython instance will give you full access to your data and
781 781 functions, and you can resume program execution once you are done with
782 782 the interactive part (perhaps to stop again later, as many times as
783 783 needed).
784 784
785 785 The following code snippet is the bare minimum you need to include in
786 786 your Python programs for this to work (detailed examples follow later)::
787 787
788 788 from IPython import embed
789 789
790 790 embed() # this call anywhere in your program will start IPython
791 791
792 792 You can also embed an IPython *kernel*, for use with qtconsole, etc. via
793 793 ``IPython.embed_kernel()``. This should function work the same way, but you can
794 794 connect an external frontend (``ipython qtconsole`` or ``ipython console``),
795 795 rather than interacting with it in the terminal.
796 796
797 797 You can run embedded instances even in code which is itself being run at
798 798 the IPython interactive prompt with '%run <filename>'. Since it's easy
799 799 to get lost as to where you are (in your top-level IPython or in your
800 800 embedded one), it's a good idea in such cases to set the in/out prompts
801 801 to something different for the embedded instances. The code examples
802 802 below illustrate this.
803 803
804 804 You can also have multiple IPython instances in your program and open
805 805 them separately, for example with different options for data
806 806 presentation. If you close and open the same instance multiple times,
807 807 its prompt counters simply continue from each execution to the next.
808 808
809 809 Please look at the docstrings in the :mod:`~IPython.frontend.terminal.embed`
810 810 module for more details on the use of this system.
811 811
812 812 The following sample file illustrating how to use the embedding
813 functionality is provided in the examples directory as example-embed.py.
813 functionality is provided in the examples directory as embed_class_long.py.
814 814 It should be fairly self-explanatory:
815 815
816 .. literalinclude:: ../../../examples/core/example-embed.py
816 .. literalinclude:: ../../../examples/Embedding/embed_class_long.py
817 817 :language: python
818 818
819 819 Once you understand how the system functions, you can use the following
820 820 code fragments in your programs which are ready for cut and paste:
821 821
822 .. literalinclude:: ../../../examples/core/example-embed-short.py
822 .. literalinclude:: ../../../examples/Embedding/embed_class_short.py
823 823 :language: python
824 824
825 825 Using the Python debugger (pdb)
826 826 ===============================
827 827
828 828 Running entire programs via pdb
829 829 -------------------------------
830 830
831 831 pdb, the Python debugger, is a powerful interactive debugger which
832 832 allows you to step through code, set breakpoints, watch variables,
833 833 etc. IPython makes it very easy to start any script under the control
834 834 of pdb, regardless of whether you have wrapped it into a 'main()'
835 835 function or not. For this, simply type ``%run -d myscript`` at an
836 836 IPython prompt. See the %run command's documentation for more details, including
837 837 how to control where pdb will stop execution first.
838 838
839 839 For more information on the use of the pdb debugger, see :ref:`debugger-commands`
840 840 in the Python documentation.
841 841
842 842
843 843 Post-mortem debugging
844 844 ---------------------
845 845
846 846 Going into a debugger when an exception occurs can be
847 847 extremely useful in order to find the origin of subtle bugs, because pdb
848 848 opens up at the point in your code which triggered the exception, and
849 849 while your program is at this point 'dead', all the data is still
850 850 available and you can walk up and down the stack frame and understand
851 851 the origin of the problem.
852 852
853 853 You can use the ``%debug`` magic after an exception has occurred to start
854 854 post-mortem debugging. IPython can also call debugger every time your code
855 855 triggers an uncaught exception. This feature can be toggled with the %pdb magic
856 856 command, or you can start IPython with the ``--pdb`` option.
857 857
858 858 For a post-mortem debugger in your programs outside IPython,
859 859 put the following lines toward the top of your 'main' routine::
860 860
861 861 import sys
862 862 from IPython.core import ultratb
863 863 sys.excepthook = ultratb.FormattedTB(mode='Verbose',
864 864 color_scheme='Linux', call_pdb=1)
865 865
866 866 The mode keyword can be either 'Verbose' or 'Plain', giving either very
867 867 detailed or normal tracebacks respectively. The color_scheme keyword can
868 868 be one of 'NoColor', 'Linux' (default) or 'LightBG'. These are the same
869 869 options which can be set in IPython with ``--colors`` and ``--xmode``.
870 870
871 871 This will give any of your programs detailed, colored tracebacks with
872 872 automatic invocation of pdb.
873 873
874 874 .. _pasting_with_prompts:
875 875
876 876 Pasting of code starting with Python or IPython prompts
877 877 =======================================================
878 878
879 879 IPython is smart enough to filter out input prompts, be they plain Python ones
880 880 (``>>>`` and ``...``) or IPython ones (``In [N]:`` and ``...:``). You can
881 881 therefore copy and paste from existing interactive sessions without worry.
882 882
883 883 The following is a 'screenshot' of how things work, copying an example from the
884 884 standard Python tutorial::
885 885
886 886 In [1]: >>> # Fibonacci series:
887 887
888 888 In [2]: ... # the sum of two elements defines the next
889 889
890 890 In [3]: ... a, b = 0, 1
891 891
892 892 In [4]: >>> while b < 10:
893 893 ...: ... print(b)
894 894 ...: ... a, b = b, a+b
895 895 ...:
896 896 1
897 897 1
898 898 2
899 899 3
900 900 5
901 901 8
902 902
903 903 And pasting from IPython sessions works equally well::
904 904
905 905 In [1]: In [5]: def f(x):
906 906 ...: ...: "A simple function"
907 907 ...: ...: return x**2
908 908 ...: ...:
909 909
910 910 In [2]: f(3)
911 911 Out[2]: 9
912 912
913 913 .. _gui_support:
914 914
915 915 GUI event loop support
916 916 ======================
917 917
918 918 .. versionadded:: 0.11
919 919 The ``%gui`` magic and :mod:`IPython.lib.inputhook`.
920 920
921 921 IPython has excellent support for working interactively with Graphical User
922 922 Interface (GUI) toolkits, such as wxPython, PyQt4/PySide, PyGTK and Tk. This is
923 923 implemented using Python's builtin ``PyOSInputHook`` hook. This implementation
924 924 is extremely robust compared to our previous thread-based version. The
925 925 advantages of this are:
926 926
927 927 * GUIs can be enabled and disabled dynamically at runtime.
928 928 * The active GUI can be switched dynamically at runtime.
929 929 * In some cases, multiple GUIs can run simultaneously with no problems.
930 930 * There is a developer API in :mod:`IPython.lib.inputhook` for customizing
931 931 all of these things.
932 932
933 933 For users, enabling GUI event loop integration is simple. You simple use the
934 934 ``%gui`` magic as follows::
935 935
936 936 %gui [GUINAME]
937 937
938 938 With no arguments, ``%gui`` removes all GUI support. Valid ``GUINAME``
939 939 arguments are ``wx``, ``qt``, ``gtk`` and ``tk``.
940 940
941 941 Thus, to use wxPython interactively and create a running :class:`wx.App`
942 942 object, do::
943 943
944 944 %gui wx
945 945
946 946 You can also start IPython with an event loop set up using the :option:`--gui`
947 947 flag::
948 948
949 949 $ ipython --gui=qt
950 950
951 951 For information on IPython's matplotlib_ integration (and the ``matplotlib``
952 952 mode) see :ref:`this section <matplotlib_support>`.
953 953
954 954 For developers that want to use IPython's GUI event loop integration in the
955 955 form of a library, these capabilities are exposed in library form in the
956 956 :mod:`IPython.lib.inputhook` and :mod:`IPython.lib.guisupport` modules.
957 957 Interested developers should see the module docstrings for more information,
958 958 but there are a few points that should be mentioned here.
959 959
960 960 First, the ``PyOSInputHook`` approach only works in command line settings
961 961 where readline is activated. The integration with various eventloops
962 962 is handled somewhat differently (and more simply) when using the standalone
963 963 kernel, as in the qtconsole and notebook.
964 964
965 965 Second, when using the ``PyOSInputHook`` approach, a GUI application should
966 966 *not* start its event loop. Instead all of this is handled by the
967 967 ``PyOSInputHook``. This means that applications that are meant to be used both
968 968 in IPython and as standalone apps need to have special code to detects how the
969 969 application is being run. We highly recommend using IPython's support for this.
970 970 Since the details vary slightly between toolkits, we point you to the various
971 971 examples in our source directory :file:`examples/lib` that demonstrate
972 972 these capabilities.
973 973
974 974 Third, unlike previous versions of IPython, we no longer "hijack" (replace
975 975 them with no-ops) the event loops. This is done to allow applications that
976 976 actually need to run the real event loops to do so. This is often needed to
977 977 process pending events at critical points.
978 978
979 979 Finally, we also have a number of examples in our source directory
980 980 :file:`examples/lib` that demonstrate these capabilities.
981 981
982 982 PyQt and PySide
983 983 ---------------
984 984
985 985 .. attempt at explanation of the complete mess that is Qt support
986 986
987 987 When you use ``--gui=qt`` or ``--matplotlib=qt``, IPython can work with either
988 988 PyQt4 or PySide. There are three options for configuration here, because
989 989 PyQt4 has two APIs for QString and QVariant - v1, which is the default on
990 990 Python 2, and the more natural v2, which is the only API supported by PySide.
991 991 v2 is also the default for PyQt4 on Python 3. IPython's code for the QtConsole
992 992 uses v2, but you can still use any interface in your code, since the
993 993 Qt frontend is in a different process.
994 994
995 995 The default will be to import PyQt4 without configuration of the APIs, thus
996 996 matching what most applications would expect. It will fall back of PySide if
997 997 PyQt4 is unavailable.
998 998
999 999 If specified, IPython will respect the environment variable ``QT_API`` used
1000 1000 by ETS. ETS 4.0 also works with both PyQt4 and PySide, but it requires
1001 1001 PyQt4 to use its v2 API. So if ``QT_API=pyside`` PySide will be used,
1002 1002 and if ``QT_API=pyqt`` then PyQt4 will be used *with the v2 API* for
1003 1003 QString and QVariant, so ETS codes like MayaVi will also work with IPython.
1004 1004
1005 1005 If you launch IPython in matplotlib mode with ``ipython --matplotlib=qt``,
1006 1006 then IPython will ask matplotlib which Qt library to use (only if QT_API is
1007 1007 *not set*), via the 'backend.qt4' rcParam. If matplotlib is version 1.0.1 or
1008 1008 older, then IPython will always use PyQt4 without setting the v2 APIs, since
1009 1009 neither v2 PyQt nor PySide work.
1010 1010
1011 1011 .. warning::
1012 1012
1013 1013 Note that this means for ETS 4 to work with PyQt4, ``QT_API`` *must* be set
1014 1014 to work with IPython's qt integration, because otherwise PyQt4 will be
1015 1015 loaded in an incompatible mode.
1016 1016
1017 1017 It also means that you must *not* have ``QT_API`` set if you want to
1018 1018 use ``--gui=qt`` with code that requires PyQt4 API v1.
1019 1019
1020 1020
1021 1021 .. _matplotlib_support:
1022 1022
1023 1023 Plotting with matplotlib
1024 1024 ========================
1025 1025
1026 1026 matplotlib_ provides high quality 2D and 3D plotting for Python. matplotlib_
1027 1027 can produce plots on screen using a variety of GUI toolkits, including Tk,
1028 1028 PyGTK, PyQt4 and wxPython. It also provides a number of commands useful for
1029 1029 scientific computing, all with a syntax compatible with that of the popular
1030 1030 Matlab program.
1031 1031
1032 1032 To start IPython with matplotlib support, use the ``--matplotlib`` switch. If
1033 1033 IPython is already running, you can run the ``%matplotlib`` magic. If no
1034 1034 arguments are given, IPython will automatically detect your choice of
1035 1035 matplotlib backend. You can also request a specific backend with
1036 1036 ``%matplotlib backend``, where ``backend`` must be one of: 'tk', 'qt', 'wx',
1037 1037 'gtk', 'osx'. In the web notebook and Qt console, 'inline' is also a valid
1038 1038 backend value, which produces static figures inlined inside the application
1039 1039 window instead of matplotlib's interactive figures that live in separate
1040 1040 windows.
1041 1041
1042 1042 .. _interactive_demos:
1043 1043
1044 1044 Interactive demos with IPython
1045 1045 ==============================
1046 1046
1047 1047 IPython ships with a basic system for running scripts interactively in
1048 1048 sections, useful when presenting code to audiences. A few tags embedded
1049 1049 in comments (so that the script remains valid Python code) divide a file
1050 1050 into separate blocks, and the demo can be run one block at a time, with
1051 1051 IPython printing (with syntax highlighting) the block before executing
1052 1052 it, and returning to the interactive prompt after each block. The
1053 1053 interactive namespace is updated after each block is run with the
1054 1054 contents of the demo's namespace.
1055 1055
1056 1056 This allows you to show a piece of code, run it and then execute
1057 1057 interactively commands based on the variables just created. Once you
1058 1058 want to continue, you simply execute the next block of the demo. The
1059 1059 following listing shows the markup necessary for dividing a script into
1060 1060 sections for execution as a demo:
1061 1061
1062 .. literalinclude:: ../../../examples/lib/example-demo.py
1062 .. literalinclude:: ../../../examples/IPython Kernel/example-demo.py
1063 1063 :language: python
1064 1064
1065 1065 In order to run a file as a demo, you must first make a Demo object out
1066 1066 of it. If the file is named myscript.py, the following code will make a
1067 1067 demo::
1068 1068
1069 1069 from IPython.lib.demo import Demo
1070 1070
1071 1071 mydemo = Demo('myscript.py')
1072 1072
1073 1073 This creates the mydemo object, whose blocks you run one at a time by
1074 1074 simply calling the object with no arguments. Then call it to run each step
1075 1075 of the demo::
1076 1076
1077 1077 mydemo()
1078 1078
1079 1079 Demo objects can be
1080 1080 restarted, you can move forward or back skipping blocks, re-execute the
1081 1081 last block, etc. See the :mod:`IPython.lib.demo` module and the
1082 1082 :class:`~IPython.lib.demo.Demo` class for details.
1083 1083
1084 1084 Limitations: These demos are limited to
1085 1085 fairly simple uses. In particular, you cannot break up sections within
1086 1086 indented code (loops, if statements, function definitions, etc.)
1087 1087 Supporting something like this would basically require tracking the
1088 1088 internal execution state of the Python interpreter, so only top-level
1089 1089 divisions are allowed. If you want to be able to open an IPython
1090 1090 instance at an arbitrary point in a program, you can use IPython's
1091 1091 :ref:`embedding facilities <Embedding>`.
1092 1092
1093 1093 .. include:: ../links.txt
@@ -1,150 +1,150 b''
1 1 .. _parallel_asyncresult:
2 2
3 3 ======================
4 4 The AsyncResult object
5 5 ======================
6 6
7 7 In non-blocking mode, :meth:`apply` submits the command to be executed and
8 8 then returns a :class:`~.AsyncResult` object immediately. The
9 9 AsyncResult object gives you a way of getting a result at a later
10 10 time through its :meth:`get` method, but it also collects metadata
11 11 on execution.
12 12
13 13
14 14 Beyond multiprocessing's AsyncResult
15 15 ====================================
16 16
17 17 .. Note::
18 18
19 19 The :class:`~.AsyncResult` object provides a superset of the interface in
20 20 :py:class:`multiprocessing.pool.AsyncResult`. See the
21 21 `official Python documentation <http://docs.python.org/library/multiprocessing#multiprocessing.pool.AsyncResult>`_
22 22 for more on the basics of this interface.
23 23
24 24 Our AsyncResult objects add a number of convenient features for working with
25 25 parallel results, beyond what is provided by the original AsyncResult.
26 26
27 27
28 28 get_dict
29 29 --------
30 30
31 31 First, is :meth:`.AsyncResult.get_dict`, which pulls results as a dictionary
32 32 keyed by engine_id, rather than a flat list. This is useful for quickly
33 33 coordinating or distributing information about all of the engines.
34 34
35 35 As an example, here is a quick call that gives every engine a dict showing
36 36 the PID of every other engine:
37 37
38 38 .. sourcecode:: ipython
39 39
40 40 In [10]: ar = rc[:].apply_async(os.getpid)
41 41 In [11]: pids = ar.get_dict()
42 42 In [12]: rc[:]['pid_map'] = pids
43 43
44 44 This trick is particularly useful when setting up inter-engine communication,
45 45 as in IPython's :file:`examples/parallel/interengine` examples.
46 46
47 47
48 48 Metadata
49 49 ========
50 50
51 51 IPython.parallel tracks some metadata about the tasks, which is stored
52 52 in the :attr:`.Client.metadata` dict. The AsyncResult object gives you an
53 53 interface for this information as well, including timestamps stdout/err,
54 54 and engine IDs.
55 55
56 56
57 57 Timing
58 58 ------
59 59
60 60 IPython tracks various timestamps as :py:class:`.datetime` objects,
61 61 and the AsyncResult object has a few properties that turn these into useful
62 62 times (in seconds as floats).
63 63
64 64 For use while the tasks are still pending:
65 65
66 66 * :attr:`ar.elapsed` is just the elapsed seconds since submission, for use
67 67 before the AsyncResult is complete.
68 68 * :attr:`ar.progress` is the number of tasks that have completed. Fractional progress
69 69 would be::
70 70
71 71 1.0 * ar.progress / len(ar)
72 72
73 73 * :meth:`AsyncResult.wait_interactive` will wait for the result to finish, but
74 74 print out status updates on progress and elapsed time while it waits.
75 75
76 76 For use after the tasks are done:
77 77
78 78 * :attr:`ar.serial_time` is the sum of the computation time of all of the tasks
79 79 done in parallel.
80 80 * :attr:`ar.wall_time` is the time between the first task submitted and last result
81 81 received. This is the actual cost of computation, including IPython overhead.
82 82
83 83
84 84 .. note::
85 85
86 86 wall_time is only precise if the Client is waiting for results when
87 87 the task finished, because the `received` timestamp is made when the result is
88 88 unpacked by the Client, triggered by the :meth:`~Client.spin` call. If you
89 89 are doing work in the Client, and not waiting/spinning, then `received` might
90 90 be artificially high.
91 91
92 92 An often interesting metric is the time it actually cost to do the work in parallel
93 93 relative to the serial computation, and this can be given simply with
94 94
95 95 .. sourcecode:: python
96 96
97 97 speedup = ar.serial_time / ar.wall_time
98 98
99 99
100 100 Map results are iterable!
101 101 =========================
102 102
103 103 When an AsyncResult object has multiple results (e.g. the :class:`~AsyncMapResult`
104 104 object), you can actually iterate through results themselves, and act on them as they arrive:
105 105
106 .. literalinclude:: ../../../examples/parallel/itermapresult.py
106 .. literalinclude:: ../../../examples/Parallel Computing/itermapresult.py
107 107 :language: python
108 108 :lines: 20-67
109 109
110 110 That is to say, if you treat an AsyncMapResult as if it were a list of your actual
111 111 results, it should behave as you would expect, with the only difference being
112 112 that you can start iterating through the results before they have even been computed.
113 113
114 114 This lets you do a dumb version of map/reduce with the builtin Python functions,
115 115 and the only difference between doing this locally and doing it remotely in parallel
116 116 is using the asynchronous view.map instead of the builtin map.
117 117
118 118
119 119 Here is a simple one-line RMS (root-mean-square) implemented with Python's builtin map/reduce.
120 120
121 121 .. sourcecode:: ipython
122 122
123 123 In [38]: X = np.linspace(0,100)
124 124
125 125 In [39]: from math import sqrt
126 126
127 127 In [40]: add = lambda a,b: a+b
128 128
129 129 In [41]: sq = lambda x: x*x
130 130
131 131 In [42]: sqrt(reduce(add, map(sq, X)) / len(X))
132 132 Out[42]: 58.028845747399714
133 133
134 134 In [43]: sqrt(reduce(add, view.map(sq, X)) / len(X))
135 135 Out[43]: 58.028845747399714
136 136
137 137 To break that down:
138 138
139 139 1. ``map(sq, X)`` Compute the square of each element in the list (locally, or in parallel)
140 140 2. ``reduce(add, sqX) / len(X)`` compute the mean by summing over the list (or AsyncMapResult)
141 141 and dividing by the size
142 142 3. take the square root of the resulting number
143 143
144 144 .. seealso::
145 145
146 146 When AsyncResult or the AsyncMapResult don't provide what you need (for instance,
147 147 handling individual results as they arrive, but with metadata), you can always
148 148 just split the original result's ``msg_ids`` attribute, and handle them as you like.
149 149
150 150 For an example of this, see :file:`examples/parallel/customresult.py`
@@ -1,177 +1,177 b''
1 1 .. _dag_dependencies:
2 2
3 3 ================
4 4 DAG Dependencies
5 5 ================
6 6
7 7 Often, parallel workflow is described in terms of a `Directed Acyclic Graph
8 8 <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Directed_acyclic_graph>`_ or DAG. A popular library
9 9 for working with Graphs is NetworkX_. Here, we will walk through a demo mapping
10 10 a nx DAG to task dependencies.
11 11
12 12 The full script that runs this demo can be found in
13 13 :file:`examples/parallel/dagdeps.py`.
14 14
15 15 Why are DAGs good for task dependencies?
16 16 ----------------------------------------
17 17
18 18 The 'G' in DAG is 'Graph'. A Graph is a collection of **nodes** and **edges** that connect
19 19 the nodes. For our purposes, each node would be a task, and each edge would be a
20 20 dependency. The 'D' in DAG stands for 'Directed'. This means that each edge has a
21 21 direction associated with it. So we can interpret the edge (a,b) as meaning that b depends
22 22 on a, whereas the edge (b,a) would mean a depends on b. The 'A' is 'Acyclic', meaning that
23 23 there must not be any closed loops in the graph. This is important for dependencies,
24 24 because if a loop were closed, then a task could ultimately depend on itself, and never be
25 25 able to run. If your workflow can be described as a DAG, then it is impossible for your
26 26 dependencies to cause a deadlock.
27 27
28 28 A Sample DAG
29 29 ------------
30 30
31 31 Here, we have a very simple 5-node DAG:
32 32
33 33 .. figure:: figs/simpledag.*
34 34 :width: 600px
35 35
36 36 With NetworkX, an arrow is just a fattened bit on the edge. Here, we can see that task 0
37 37 depends on nothing, and can run immediately. 1 and 2 depend on 0; 3 depends on
38 38 1 and 2; and 4 depends only on 1.
39 39
40 40 A possible sequence of events for this workflow:
41 41
42 42 0. Task 0 can run right away
43 43 1. 0 finishes, so 1,2 can start
44 44 2. 1 finishes, 3 is still waiting on 2, but 4 can start right away
45 45 3. 2 finishes, and 3 can finally start
46 46
47 47
48 48 Further, taking failures into account, assuming all dependencies are run with the default
49 49 `success=True,failure=False`, the following cases would occur for each node's failure:
50 50
51 51 0. fails: all other tasks fail as Impossible
52 52 1. 2 can still succeed, but 3,4 are unreachable
53 53 2. 3 becomes unreachable, but 4 is unaffected
54 54 3. and 4. are terminal, and can have no effect on other nodes
55 55
56 56 The code to generate the simple DAG:
57 57
58 58 .. sourcecode:: python
59 59
60 60 import networkx as nx
61 61
62 62 G = nx.DiGraph()
63 63
64 64 # add 5 nodes, labeled 0-4:
65 65 map(G.add_node, range(5))
66 66 # 1,2 depend on 0:
67 67 G.add_edge(0,1)
68 68 G.add_edge(0,2)
69 69 # 3 depends on 1,2
70 70 G.add_edge(1,3)
71 71 G.add_edge(2,3)
72 72 # 4 depends on 1
73 73 G.add_edge(1,4)
74 74
75 75 # now draw the graph:
76 76 pos = { 0 : (0,0), 1 : (1,1), 2 : (-1,1),
77 77 3 : (0,2), 4 : (2,2)}
78 78 nx.draw(G, pos, edge_color='r')
79 79
80 80
81 81 For demonstration purposes, we have a function that generates a random DAG with a given
82 82 number of nodes and edges.
83 83
84 .. literalinclude:: ../../../examples/parallel/dagdeps.py
84 .. literalinclude:: ../../../examples/Parallel Computing/dagdeps.py
85 85 :language: python
86 86 :lines: 20-36
87 87
88 88 So first, we start with a graph of 32 nodes, with 128 edges:
89 89
90 90 .. sourcecode:: ipython
91 91
92 92 In [2]: G = random_dag(32,128)
93 93
94 94 Now, we need to build our dict of jobs corresponding to the nodes on the graph:
95 95
96 96 .. sourcecode:: ipython
97 97
98 98 In [3]: jobs = {}
99 99
100 100 # in reality, each job would presumably be different
101 101 # randomwait is just a function that sleeps for a random interval
102 102 In [4]: for node in G:
103 103 ...: jobs[node] = randomwait
104 104
105 105 Once we have a dict of jobs matching the nodes on the graph, we can start submitting jobs,
106 106 and linking up the dependencies. Since we don't know a job's msg_id until it is submitted,
107 107 which is necessary for building dependencies, it is critical that we don't submit any jobs
108 108 before other jobs it may depend on. Fortunately, NetworkX provides a
109 109 :meth:`topological_sort` method which ensures exactly this. It presents an iterable, that
110 110 guarantees that when you arrive at a node, you have already visited all the nodes it
111 111 on which it depends:
112 112
113 113 .. sourcecode:: ipython
114 114
115 115 In [5]: rc = Client()
116 116 In [5]: view = rc.load_balanced_view()
117 117
118 118 In [6]: results = {}
119 119
120 120 In [7]: for node in nx.topological_sort(G):
121 121 ...: # get list of AsyncResult objects from nodes
122 122 ...: # leading into this one as dependencies
123 123 ...: deps = [ results[n] for n in G.predecessors(node) ]
124 124 ...: # submit and store AsyncResult object
125 125 ...: with view.temp_flags(after=deps, block=False):
126 126 ...: results[node] = view.apply_with_flags(jobs[node])
127 127
128 128
129 129 Now that we have submitted all the jobs, we can wait for the results:
130 130
131 131 .. sourcecode:: ipython
132 132
133 133 In [8]: view.wait(results.values())
134 134
135 135 Now, at least we know that all the jobs ran and did not fail (``r.get()`` would have
136 136 raised an error if a task failed). But we don't know that the ordering was properly
137 137 respected. For this, we can use the :attr:`metadata` attribute of each AsyncResult.
138 138
139 139 These objects store a variety of metadata about each task, including various timestamps.
140 140 We can validate that the dependencies were respected by checking that each task was
141 141 started after all of its predecessors were completed:
142 142
143 .. literalinclude:: ../../../examples/parallel/dagdeps.py
143 .. literalinclude:: ../../../examples/Parallel Computing/dagdeps.py
144 144 :language: python
145 145 :lines: 64-70
146 146
147 147 We can also validate the graph visually. By drawing the graph with each node's x-position
148 148 as its start time, all arrows must be pointing to the right if dependencies were respected.
149 149 For spreading, the y-position will be the runtime of the task, so long tasks
150 150 will be at the top, and quick, small tasks will be at the bottom.
151 151
152 152 .. sourcecode:: ipython
153 153
154 154 In [10]: from matplotlib.dates import date2num
155 155
156 156 In [11]: from matplotlib.cm import gist_rainbow
157 157
158 158 In [12]: pos = {}; colors = {}
159 159
160 160 In [12]: for node in G:
161 161 ....: md = results[node].metadata
162 162 ....: start = date2num(md.started)
163 163 ....: runtime = date2num(md.completed) - start
164 164 ....: pos[node] = (start, runtime)
165 165 ....: colors[node] = md.engine_id
166 166
167 167 In [13]: nx.draw(G, pos, node_list=colors.keys(), node_color=colors.values(),
168 168 ....: cmap=gist_rainbow)
169 169
170 170 .. figure:: figs/dagdeps.*
171 171 :width: 600px
172 172
173 173 Time started on x, runtime on y, and color-coded by engine-id (in this case there
174 174 were four engines). Edges denote dependencies.
175 175
176 176
177 177 .. _NetworkX: http://networkx.lanl.gov/
@@ -1,208 +1,208 b''
1 1 .. _parallel_examples:
2 2
3 3 =================
4 4 Parallel examples
5 5 =================
6 6
7 7 In this section we describe two more involved examples of using an IPython
8 8 cluster to perform a parallel computation. We will be doing some plotting,
9 9 so we start IPython with matplotlib integration by typing::
10 10
11 11 ipython --matplotlib
12 12
13 13 at the system command line.
14 14 Or you can enable matplotlib integration at any point with:
15 15
16 16 .. sourcecode:: ipython
17 17
18 18 In [1]: %matplotlib
19 19
20 20
21 21 150 million digits of pi
22 22 ========================
23 23
24 24 In this example we would like to study the distribution of digits in the
25 25 number pi (in base 10). While it is not known if pi is a normal number (a
26 26 number is normal in base 10 if 0-9 occur with equal likelihood) numerical
27 27 investigations suggest that it is. We will begin with a serial calculation on
28 28 10,000 digits of pi and then perform a parallel calculation involving 150
29 29 million digits.
30 30
31 31 In both the serial and parallel calculation we will be using functions defined
32 32 in the :file:`pidigits.py` file, which is available in the
33 33 :file:`examples/parallel` directory of the IPython source distribution.
34 34 These functions provide basic facilities for working with the digits of pi and
35 35 can be loaded into IPython by putting :file:`pidigits.py` in your current
36 36 working directory and then doing:
37 37
38 38 .. sourcecode:: ipython
39 39
40 40 In [1]: run pidigits.py
41 41
42 42 Serial calculation
43 43 ------------------
44 44
45 45 For the serial calculation, we will use `SymPy <http://www.sympy.org>`_ to
46 46 calculate 10,000 digits of pi and then look at the frequencies of the digits
47 47 0-9. Out of 10,000 digits, we expect each digit to occur 1,000 times. While
48 48 SymPy is capable of calculating many more digits of pi, our purpose here is to
49 49 set the stage for the much larger parallel calculation.
50 50
51 51 In this example, we use two functions from :file:`pidigits.py`:
52 52 :func:`one_digit_freqs` (which calculates how many times each digit occurs)
53 53 and :func:`plot_one_digit_freqs` (which uses Matplotlib to plot the result).
54 54 Here is an interactive IPython session that uses these functions with
55 55 SymPy:
56 56
57 57 .. sourcecode:: ipython
58 58
59 59 In [7]: import sympy
60 60
61 61 In [8]: pi = sympy.pi.evalf(40)
62 62
63 63 In [9]: pi
64 64 Out[9]: 3.141592653589793238462643383279502884197
65 65
66 66 In [10]: pi = sympy.pi.evalf(10000)
67 67
68 68 In [11]: digits = (d for d in str(pi)[2:]) # create a sequence of digits
69 69
70 70 In [13]: freqs = one_digit_freqs(digits)
71 71
72 72 In [14]: plot_one_digit_freqs(freqs)
73 73 Out[14]: [<matplotlib.lines.Line2D object at 0x18a55290>]
74 74
75 75 The resulting plot of the single digit counts shows that each digit occurs
76 76 approximately 1,000 times, but that with only 10,000 digits the
77 77 statistical fluctuations are still rather large:
78 78
79 79 .. image:: figs/single_digits.*
80 80
81 81 It is clear that to reduce the relative fluctuations in the counts, we need
82 82 to look at many more digits of pi. That brings us to the parallel calculation.
83 83
84 84 Parallel calculation
85 85 --------------------
86 86
87 87 Calculating many digits of pi is a challenging computational problem in itself.
88 88 Because we want to focus on the distribution of digits in this example, we
89 89 will use pre-computed digit of pi from the website of Professor Yasumasa
90 90 Kanada at the University of Tokyo (http://www.super-computing.org). These
91 91 digits come in a set of text files (ftp://pi.super-computing.org/.2/pi200m/)
92 92 that each have 10 million digits of pi.
93 93
94 94 For the parallel calculation, we have copied these files to the local hard
95 95 drives of the compute nodes. A total of 15 of these files will be used, for a
96 96 total of 150 million digits of pi. To make things a little more interesting we
97 97 will calculate the frequencies of all 2 digits sequences (00-99) and then plot
98 98 the result using a 2D matrix in Matplotlib.
99 99
100 100 The overall idea of the calculation is simple: each IPython engine will
101 101 compute the two digit counts for the digits in a single file. Then in a final
102 102 step the counts from each engine will be added up. To perform this
103 103 calculation, we will need two top-level functions from :file:`pidigits.py`:
104 104
105 .. literalinclude:: ../../../examples/parallel/pi/pidigits.py
105 .. literalinclude:: ../../../examples/Parallel Computing/pi/pidigits.py
106 106 :language: python
107 107 :lines: 47-62
108 108
109 109 We will also use the :func:`plot_two_digit_freqs` function to plot the
110 110 results. The code to run this calculation in parallel is contained in
111 111 :file:`examples/parallel/parallelpi.py`. This code can be run in parallel
112 112 using IPython by following these steps:
113 113
114 114 1. Use :command:`ipcluster` to start 15 engines. We used 16 cores of an SGE linux
115 115 cluster (1 controller + 15 engines).
116 116 2. With the file :file:`parallelpi.py` in your current working directory, open
117 117 up IPython, enable matplotlib, and type ``run parallelpi.py``. This will download
118 118 the pi files via ftp the first time you run it, if they are not
119 119 present in the Engines' working directory.
120 120
121 121 When run on our 16 cores, we observe a speedup of 14.2x. This is slightly
122 122 less than linear scaling (16x) because the controller is also running on one of
123 123 the cores.
124 124
125 125 To emphasize the interactive nature of IPython, we now show how the
126 126 calculation can also be run by simply typing the commands from
127 127 :file:`parallelpi.py` interactively into IPython:
128 128
129 129 .. sourcecode:: ipython
130 130
131 131 In [1]: from IPython.parallel import Client
132 132
133 133 # The Client allows us to use the engines interactively.
134 134 # We simply pass Client the name of the cluster profile we
135 135 # are using.
136 136 In [2]: c = Client(profile='mycluster')
137 137 In [3]: v = c[:]
138 138
139 139 In [3]: c.ids
140 140 Out[3]: [0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14]
141 141
142 142 In [4]: run pidigits.py
143 143
144 144 In [5]: filestring = 'pi200m.ascii.%(i)02dof20'
145 145
146 146 # Create the list of files to process.
147 147 In [6]: files = [filestring % {'i':i} for i in range(1,16)]
148 148
149 149 In [7]: files
150 150 Out[7]:
151 151 ['pi200m.ascii.01of20',
152 152 'pi200m.ascii.02of20',
153 153 'pi200m.ascii.03of20',
154 154 'pi200m.ascii.04of20',
155 155 'pi200m.ascii.05of20',
156 156 'pi200m.ascii.06of20',
157 157 'pi200m.ascii.07of20',
158 158 'pi200m.ascii.08of20',
159 159 'pi200m.ascii.09of20',
160 160 'pi200m.ascii.10of20',
161 161 'pi200m.ascii.11of20',
162 162 'pi200m.ascii.12of20',
163 163 'pi200m.ascii.13of20',
164 164 'pi200m.ascii.14of20',
165 165 'pi200m.ascii.15of20']
166 166
167 167 # download the data files if they don't already exist:
168 168 In [8]: v.map(fetch_pi_file, files)
169 169
170 170 # This is the parallel calculation using the Client.map method
171 171 # which applies compute_two_digit_freqs to each file in files in parallel.
172 172 In [9]: freqs_all = v.map(compute_two_digit_freqs, files)
173 173
174 174 # Add up the frequencies from each engine.
175 175 In [10]: freqs = reduce_freqs(freqs_all)
176 176
177 177 In [11]: plot_two_digit_freqs(freqs)
178 178 Out[11]: <matplotlib.image.AxesImage object at 0x18beb110>
179 179
180 180 In [12]: plt.title('2 digit counts of 150m digits of pi')
181 181 Out[12]: <matplotlib.text.Text object at 0x18d1f9b0>
182 182
183 183 The resulting plot generated by Matplotlib is shown below. The colors indicate
184 184 which two digit sequences are more (red) or less (blue) likely to occur in the
185 185 first 150 million digits of pi. We clearly see that the sequence "41" is
186 186 most likely and that "06" and "07" are least likely. Further analysis would
187 187 show that the relative size of the statistical fluctuations have decreased
188 188 compared to the 10,000 digit calculation.
189 189
190 190 .. image:: figs/two_digit_counts.*
191 191
192 192 Conclusion
193 193 ==========
194 194
195 195 To conclude these examples, we summarize the key features of IPython's
196 196 parallel architecture that have been demonstrated:
197 197
198 198 * Serial code can be parallelized often with only a few extra lines of code.
199 199 We have used the :class:`DirectView` and :class:`LoadBalancedView` classes
200 200 for this purpose.
201 201 * The resulting parallel code can be run without ever leaving the IPython's
202 202 interactive shell.
203 203 * Any data computed in parallel can be explored interactively through
204 204 visualization or further numerical calculations.
205 205 * We have run these examples on a cluster running RHEL 5 and Sun GridEngine.
206 206 IPython's built in support for SGE (and other batch systems) makes it easy
207 207 to get started with IPython's parallel capabilities.
208 208
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