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=====================
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Development version
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=====================
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This document describes in-flight development work.
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Redesigned IPython notebook user interface
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------------------------------------------
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(Add description & screenshots of the many changes to the notebook)
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Improved tooltips
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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The object tooltips have gained some new functionality. By pressing tab several
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times, you can expand them to see more of a docstring, keep them visible as you
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fill in a function's parameters, or transfer the information to the pager at the
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bottom of the screen. For the details, look at the example notebook
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:file:`01_notebook_introduction.ipynb`.
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Cell magics
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-----------
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IPython's ``%magic`` functions have been extended to let you change the meaning
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of a whole cell using the first line. For example, to time the execution of
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several statements::
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%%timeit x = 0 # setup
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for i in range(100000):
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x += i**2
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This is particularly useful to integrate code in another language, and cell
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magics already exist for shell scripts, Cython, R and Octave. Using ``%%script
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/usr/bin/foo``, you can run a cell in any interpreter that accepts code via
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stdin.
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Another handy cell magic makes it easy to write short text files: ``%%file
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~/save/to/here.txt``.
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To allow these features, the API for magic functions has been refactored and
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made more powerful (:ghpull:`1732`).
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Tab completer improvements
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--------------------------
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Useful tab-completion based on live inspection of objects is one of the most
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popular features of IPython. To make this process even more user-friendly, the
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completers of both the Qt console and the Notebook have been reworked.
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The Qt console comes with a new ncurses-like tab completer, activated by
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default, which lets you cycle through the available completions by pressing tab,
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or select a completion with the arrow keys (:ghpull:`1851`).
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.. figure:: ../_static/ipy_o13_qtconsole_completer.png
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:width: 400px
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:alt: ncurses-like completer, with highlighted selection.
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:align: center
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:target: ../_static/ipy_o13_qtconsole_completer.png
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The new improved Qt console's ncurses-like completer allows to easily
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navigate thought long list of completions.
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In the notebook, completions are now sourced both from object introspection and
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analysis of surrounding code, so limited completions can be offered for
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variables defined in the current cell, or while the kernel is busy
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(:ghpull:`1711`).
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Other new features
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------------------
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* **%install_ext**: A new magic function to install an IPython extension from
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a URL. E.g. ``%install_ext
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https://bitbucket.org/birkenfeld/ipython-physics/raw/default/physics.py``.
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* The ``%loadpy`` magic is no longer restricted to Python files, and has been
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renamed ``%load``. The old name remains as an alias.
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* New command line arguments will help external programs find IPython folders:
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``ipython locate`` finds the user's IPython directory, and ``ipython locate
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profile foo`` finds the folder for the 'foo' profile (if it exists).
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* The :envvar:`IPYTHON_DIR` environment variable, introduced in the Great
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Reorganization of 0.11 and existing only in versions 0.11-0.13, has been
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deprecated. As described in :ghissue:`1167`, the complexity and confusion of
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migrating to this variable is not worth the aesthetic improvement. Please use
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the historical :envvar:`IPYTHONDIR` environment variable instead.
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* The default value of *interactivity* passed from
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:meth:`~IPython.core.interactiveshell.InteractiveShell.run_cell` to
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:meth:`~IPython.core.interactiveshell.InteractiveShell.run_ast_nodes`
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is now configurable.
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Backwards incompatible changes
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------------------------------
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* The exception :exc:`IPython.core.error.TryNext` previously accepted
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arguments and keyword arguments to be passed to the next implementation
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of the hook. This feature was removed as it made error message propagation
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difficult and violated the principle of loose coupling.
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