Here are basic commands to navigate UNIX and edit files.
When you open a terminal window, you're placed at a command prompt:
[cs421-ta@nova ~]$
The prompt shows your username, the host you are logged onto, and
your current location in the directory structure (your path). The
tilde character is shorthand for your home directory. Note your
prompt may look slightly different. To make a directory, use the
mkdir
command. Use cd
to change to that directory:
[cs421-ta@nova ~]$ mkdir foo
[cs421-ta@nova
~]$ cd foo
[cs421-ta@nova ~/foo]$
Use ls
to see a listing of the
contents of a directory, and touch
to
create an empty file:
[cs421-ta@nova ~/foo]$ ls
[cs421-ta@nova
~/foo]$ touch hello_world
[cs421-ta@nova ~/foo]$
ls
hello_world
[cs421-ta@nova ~/foo]$ cd ..
[cs421-ta@nova
~]$
Download python_basics.zip
into your home directory (note: the zip file's name may be slightly
different when you download it). Use unzip
to extract the contents of the zip file:
[cs421-ta@nova ~]$ ls
*.zip
python_basics.zip
[cs421-ta@nova ~]$ unzip
python_basics.zip
[cs421-ta@nova ~]$ cd
python_basics
[cs421-ta@nova ~/python_basics]$
ls
foreach.py
helloWorld.py
listcomp.py
listcomp2.py
quickSort.py
shop.py
shopTest.py
Some other useful Unix commands:
cp
copies a file or files
rm
removes (deletes) a file
mv
moves a file (i.e., cut/paste instead of copy/paste)
man
displays documentation for a command
pwd
prints your current path
xterm
opens a new terminal window
firefox
opens a web browser
Press "Ctrl-c" to kill a running process
Append &
to a command to run it in the background
fg
brings a program running in
the background to the foreground
Emacs is a customizable text editor which has some nice features
specifically tailored for programmers. However, you can use any other
text editor that you may prefer (such as vi
,
pico
, or joe
on Unix; or Notepad on Windows; or TextWrangler on OS X; and many
more).
To run Emacs, type emacs
at a command
prompt:
[cs421-ta@nova ~/python_basics]$ emacs
helloWorld.py &
[1] 3262
Here we gave the argument helloWorld.py
which will either open that file for editing if it exists, or create
it otherwise. Emacs notices that this is a Python source file
(because of the .py
ending) and enters
Python-mode, which is supposed to help you write code. When editing
this file you may notice some of that text becomes automatically
colored: this is syntax highlighting to help you distinguish items
such as keywords, variables, strings, and comments. Pressing Enter,
Tab, or Backspace may cause the cursor to jump to weird locations:
this is because Python is very picky about indentation, and Emacs is
predicting the proper tabbing that you should use.
Some basic Emacs editing commands (C-
means "while holding the Ctrl-key"):
C-x C-s
Save the current file
C-x C-f
Open a file, or create a new file it if doesn't exist
C-k
Cut a line, add it to the clipboard
C-y
Paste the contents of the clipboard
C-_
Undo
C-g
Abort a half-entered
command
You can also copy and paste using just the mouse. Using the left button, select a region of text to copy. Click the middle button to paste.
There are two ways you can use Emacs to develop Python code. The
most straightforward way is to use it just as a text editor: create
and edit Python files in Emacs; then run Python to test the code
somewhere else, like in a terminal window. Alternatively, you can run
Python inside Emacs: see the options under "Python" in the
menubar, or type C-c !
to start a Python
interpreter in a split screen. (Use C-x o
to switch between the split screens, or just click if C-x doesn't
work).
If you want to spend some extra setup time becoming a power user, you can try an IDE like Eclipse (Download the Eclipse Classic package at the bottom). Check out PyDev for Python support in Eclipse.