Jamison White

In the last month, I have been reading Collective Intelligence and checking out the Google API’s. Both of these source make heavy use of Python. However, I have been spoiled by Visual Studio and I want a good IDE for programming. The basic command line and IDLE just were not cutting it. I have found two good solutions.

For quick and dirty testing using Notepad++ with the NppExec plugin is working like a charm. Notepad++ has become my goto text editor in most situations. I did an add and save a command for NppExec (Plugins->NppExec->Execute). The command I am using is:

“c:python30python.exe” “$(FULL_CURRENT_PATH)”

For more involved projects Open Komodo (aka Komodo Edit) appears to be the right tool. It’s a bit heavier than Notepad++, but it handles web projects and Django files.

Jeff Atwood’s post at Coding Horror reminded me of a couple simple rules for programming (and life).

1. DRY – Don’t Repeat Yourself

2. KISS – Keep It Simple, Stupid

3. YAGNI – You Ain’t Gonna Need It