Playing with IronPython again

It's been quite a while I haven't posted anything on this blog. I was too lazy to write. Now that I regain the composure, try to write again.

I have tried IronPython 2.6 before. It was presented in Python User Group Singapore somewhere last year which captured my attention. The IronPython made it easy to play around with .NET and Silverlight stuffs -- which not easy for me as I haven't play with .NET stuffs for quite sometime. It worked well that time. Recently when I want to run the ipy.exe interpreter, I came into certain problem. I was running it on Vista box, but the application crashed after I started, after around 30 seconds waiting for nothing. I try to do some ordinary "dance" like unistall-install, with no luck.

Today I gave it a try again, and eventually it worked after I installed the .NET framework 4 and Silverlight 4 from the download site. I wasn't sure what I missed, nevertheless now it works.

I tried some stuffs with Silverlight only to remind that I need a XAML editor to edit forms. I tried to download and use kaxaml from http://www.kaxaml.com, but haven't had much luck. It installs well, but didn't run quite well.

PyDev 1.5 on Eclipse Galileo 3.5 SR1

I begin to have more time to explore the Eclipse Galileo Service Release 1 (Eclipse 3.5.1). This time I want to set it up for my Python development, using the PyDev plugin.

PyDev is an Eclipse plugin for Python language application development. It supports CPython, Jython and IronPython runtimes. It supports the interactive as well as non-interactive Python development on Eclipse IDE.

Eclipse IDE (and platform) has become the de facto industry standard IDE. More and more free software, open source software, and proprietary software makers build their systems on Eclipse platform. Galileo is the codename for 3.5 release, and now the latest one is the SR1 (Service Release 1).

There has been interesting development on PyDev since its last 1.4.7 version. PyDev has moved to be sheltered under the umbrella of Aptana. PyDev and PyDev Extension now has been merged and both now open source (previously the PyDev Extension, the advanced version of PyDev was not an open source).

The update site has been moved from domain www.fabioz.com (http://www.fabioz.com/pydev) to domain pydev.org (http://pydev.org/updates) . Aptana  This development looks good for me, means that PyDev now being maintained by its own organization, and hopefully in more serious efforts.

In Eclipse Galileo, you need to go to the menu and choose: Help > Install New Software...

It will show the Install dialog.

Click the [Add] button on the upper of menu dialog. You will get the "Add Site" dialog.

Type name and location.
Name: "PyDev Update  Site" (you can feel with any arbitrary name though)
Location: http://pydev.org/updates

Back to the "Install" dialog, the previous "Add Site" will fill up the "Work with" field for you.

Now tick the Checkbox "PyDev for Eclipse" under "PyDev". You may also optionally tick the "Pydev Mylyn Integration". In this example we don't tick.

Click the [Next >] button. It will show you the Install Details:

Proceed by clicking [Next >] button. Review Licenses dialog will be displayed.

Click the radio button "I accept the terms of the license  agreement" when you are agree with the licenses. Proceed by clicking [Finish] button.

You will see the progress bar. Somewhere around the progress, you will be asked whether to install software that contains unsigned content.

Click [OK] to proceed (we have no choice as long as the provider of this plugin hasn't signed the content).

Click the [Yes] button to restart your Eclipse IDE.