Re: [Visualpython-users] What is IDLE?

[Bruce S. <ba...@an...>]

I don't recognize these behaviors. The VPython installer (used after 
installing Python 2.0 on Windows) creates an icon on the desktop which when 
doubled-clicked invokes C:\Python20\Tools\idle\idle.pyw, not idle.bat (I 
don't know under what circumstances idle.bat would be of any use). A 
similar shortcut to idle.pyw is listed on the Start menu under Python 2.0 
as "IDLE (Python GUI)". The puzzle is, where did you find a shortcut to 
idle.bat?

Invoking idle.pyw brings up an editing environment, "IDLE", which was 
modified by Dave Scherer from the standard one distributed with Python 2.0. 
This modified version has many nice features for rapid edit/run cycles. 
Press F5 to run, and your file is automatically saved and a (safe) separate 
process is spawned to run your program. Print output goes to a separate 
scrolling window which nicely packages output from consecutive runs if you 
don't deliberately kill that window. Pressing F1 gives you useful 
documentation on Python and on the Visual module.

Bruce Sherwood

--On Tuesday, April 10, 2001 12:54 -0500 Andrew Morrison 
<mo...@tb...> wrote:

> When I install on Windows, I get a shortcut to idle.bat which is in my
> C:\Python20\Tools\idle directory.  Looking at the file, I see that it
> calls the "start" program from \Windows\Command to execute the idle.pyw
> file in the same directory.
>
> The reason I am curious, is that I would like to know what IDLE is, as far
> as Windows is concerned.  Is there a way to get into IDLE by calling an
> executable program that is in the \Python20 directory?  If there is, I
> haven't figured out how to do it, and I'd be curious to know if it is
> possible or not.