Warning

This documentation covers a development version of IPython. The development version may differ significantly from the latest stable release.

Important

This documentation covers IPython versions 6.0 and higher. Beginning with version 6.0, IPython stopped supporting compatibility with Python versions lower than 3.3 including all versions of Python 2.7.

If you are looking for an IPython version compatible with Python 2.7, please use the IPython 5.x LTS release and refer to its documentation (LTS is the long term support release).

7.x Series¶

IPython 7.11.1¶

A couple of deprecated functions (no-op) have been reintroduces in py3compat as Cython was still relying on them, and will be removed in a couple of versions.

IPython 7.11¶

IPython 7.11 received a couple of compatibility fixes and code cleanup.

A number of function in the py3compat have been removed; a number of types in the IPython code base are now non-ambiguous and now always unicode instead of Union[Unicode,bytes]; many of the relevant code path have thus been simplified/cleaned and types annotation added.

IPython support several verbosity level from exceptions. xmode plain now support chained exceptions. PR #11999

We are starting to remove shell=True in some usages of subprocess. While not directly a security issue (as IPython is made to run arbitrary code anyway) it is not good practice and we’d like to show the example. #12023. This discussion was started by @mschwager thanks to a new auditing tool they are working on with duo-labs (dlint).

Work around some bugs in Python 3.9 tokenizer PR #12057

IPython will now print its version after a crash. PR #11986

This is likely the last release from the 7.x series that will see new feature. The master branch will soon accept large code changes and thrilling new features; the 7.x branch will only start to accept critical bug fixes, and update dependencies.

IPython 7.10.2¶

IPython 7.10.2 fix a couple of extra incompatibility between IPython, ipdb, asyncio and Prompt Toolkit 3.

IPython 7.10.1¶

IPython 7.10.1 fix a couple of incompatibilities with Prompt toolkit 3 (please update Prompt toolkit to 3.0.2 at least), and fixes some interaction with headless IPython.

IPython 7.10.0¶

IPython 7.10 is the first double digit minor release in the last decade, and first since the release of IPython 1.0, previous double digit minor release was in August 2009.

We’ve been trying to give you regular release on the last Friday of every month for a guaranty of rapid access to bug fixes and new features.

Unlike the previous first few releases that have seen only a couple of code changes, 7.10 bring a number of changes, new features and bugfixes.

Stop Support for Python 3.5 – Adopt NEP 29¶

IPython has decided to follow the informational NEP 29 which layout a clear policy as to which version of (C)Python and NumPy are supported.

We thus dropped support for Python 3.5, and cleaned up a number of code path that were Python-version dependant. If you are on 3.5 or earlier pip should automatically give you the latest compatible version of IPython so you do not need to pin to a given version.

Support for Prompt Toolkit 3.0¶

Prompt Toolkit 3.0 was release a week before IPython 7.10 and introduces a few breaking changes. We believe IPython 7.10 should be compatible with both Prompt Toolkit 2.x and 3.x, though it has not been extensively tested with 3.x so please report any issues.

Prompt Rendering Performance improvements¶

Pull Request PR #11933 introduced an optimisation in the prompt rendering logic that should decrease the resource usage of IPython when using the _default_ configuration but could potentially introduce a regression of functionalities if you are using a custom prompt.

We know assume if you haven’t changed the default keybindings that the prompt will not change during the duration of your input – which is for example not true when using vi insert mode that switches between [ins] and [nor] for the current mode.

If you are experiencing any issue let us know.

Code autoformatting¶

The IPython terminal can now auto format your code just before entering a new line or executing a command. To do so use the --TerminalInteractiveShell.autoformatter option and set it to 'black'; if black is installed IPython will use black to format your code when possible.

IPython cannot always properly format your code; in particular it will auto formatting with black will only work if:

Your code does not contains magics or special python syntax.

There is no code after your cursor.

The Black API is also still in motion; so this may not work with all versions of black.

It should be possible to register custom formatter, though the API is till in flux.

Arbitrary Mimetypes Handing in Terminal (Aka inline images in terminal)¶

When using IPython terminal it is now possible to register function to handle arbitrary mimetypes. While rendering non-text based representation was possible in many jupyter frontend; it was not possible in terminal IPython, as usually terminal are limited to displaying text. As many terminal these days provide escape sequences to display non-text; bringing this loved feature to IPython CLI made a lot of sens. This functionality will not only allow inline images; but allow opening of external program; for example mplayer to “display” sound files.

So far only the hooks necessary for this are in place, but no default mime renderers added; so inline images will only be available via extensions. We will progressively enable these features by default in the next few releases, and contribution is welcomed.

We welcome any feedback on the API. See Mime Renderer Extensions for more informations.

This is originally based on work form in PR #10610 from @stephanh42 started over two years ago, and still a lot need to be done.

MISC¶

Completions can define their own ordering PR #11855

Enable Plotting in the same cell than the one that import matplotlib PR #11916

Allow to store and restore multiple variables at once PR #11930

You can see all pull-requests for this release.

API Changes¶

Change of API and exposed objects automatically detected using frappuccino (still in beta):

The following items are new in IPython 7.10:

+ IPython.terminal.shortcuts.reformat_text_before_cursor(buffer, document, shell)
+ IPython.terminal.interactiveshell.PTK3
+ IPython.terminal.interactiveshell.black_reformat_handler(text_before_cursor)
+ IPython.terminal.prompts.RichPromptDisplayHook.write_format_data(self, format_dict, md_dict='None')

The following items have been removed in 7.10:

- IPython.lib.pretty.DICT_IS_ORDERED

The following signatures differ between versions:

- IPython.extensions.storemagic.restore_aliases(ip)
+ IPython.extensions.storemagic.restore_aliases(ip, alias='None')

Special Thanks¶

@stephanh42 who started the work on inline images in terminal 2 years ago

@augustogoulart who spent a lot of time triaging issues and responding to users.

@con-f-use who is my (@Carreau) first sponsor on GitHub, as a reminder if you like IPython, Jupyter and many other library of the SciPy stack you can donate to numfocus.org non profit

IPython 7.9.0¶

IPython 7.9 is a small release with a couple of improvement and bug fixes.

Xterm terminal title should be restored on exit PR #11910

special variables _,``__``, ___ are not set anymore when cache size is 0 or less. PR #11877

Autoreload should have regained some speed by using a new heuristic logic to find all objects needing reload. This should avoid large objects traversal like pandas dataframes. PR #11876

Get ready for Python 4. PR #11874

%env Magic now has heuristic to hide potentially sensitive values PR #11896

This is a small release despite a number of Pull Request Pending that need to be reviewed/worked on. Many of the core developers have been busy outside of IPython/Jupyter and we thanks all contributor for their patience; we’ll work on these as soon as we have time.

IPython 7.8.0¶

IPython 7.8.0 contain a few bugfix and 2 new APIs:

Enable changing the font color for LaTeX rendering PR #11840

and Re-Expose some PDB API (see below)

Expose Pdb API¶

Expose the built-in pdb.Pdb API. Pdb constructor arguments are generically exposed, regardless of python version. Newly exposed arguments:

skip - Python 3.1+
nosiginnt - Python 3.2+
readrc - Python 3.6+

Try it out:

from IPython.terminal.debugger import TerminalPdb
pdb = TerminalPdb(skip=["skipthismodule"])

See PR #11840

IPython 7.7.0¶

IPython 7.7.0 contain multiple bug fixes and documentation updates; Here are a few of the outstanding issue fixed:

Fix a bug introduced in 7.6 where the %matplotlib magic would fail on previously acceptable arguments PR #11814.

Fix the manage location on freebsd PR #11808.

Fix error message about aliases after %reset call in ipykernel PR #11806

Fix Duplication completions in emacs PR #11803

We are planning to adopt NEP29 (still currently in draft) which may make this minor version of IPython the last one to support Python 3.5 and will make the code base more aggressive toward removing compatibility with older versions of Python.

GitHub now support to give only “Triage” permissions to users; if you’d like to help close stale issues and labels issues please reach to us with your GitHub Username and we’ll add you to the triage team. It is a great way to start contributing and a path toward getting commit rights.

IPython 7.6.1¶

IPython 7.6.1 contain a critical bugfix in the %timeit magic, which would crash on some inputs as a side effect of PR #11716. See PR #11812

IPython 7.6.0¶

IPython 7.6.0 contains a couple of bug fixes and number of small features additions as well as some compatibility with the current development version of Python 3.8.

Add a -l option to %psearch to list the available search types. PR #11672

Support PathLike for DisplayObject and Image. PR #11764

Configurability of timeout in the test suite for slow platforms. PR #11756

Accept any casing for matplotlib backend. PR #121748

Properly skip test that requires numpy to be installed PR #11723

More support for Python 3.8 and positional only arguments (pep570) PR #11720

Unicode names for the completion are loaded lazily on first use which should decrease startup time. PR #11693

Autoreload now update the types of reloaded objects; this for example allow pickling of reloaded objects. PR #11644

Fix a bug where %%time magic would suppress cell output. PR #11716

Prepare migration to pytest (instead of nose) for testing¶

Most of the work between 7.5 and 7.6 was to prepare the migration from our testing framework to pytest. Most of the test suite should now work by simply issuing pytest from the root of the repository.

The migration to pytest is just at its beginning. Many of our test still rely on IPython-specific plugins for nose using pytest (doctest using IPython syntax is one example of this where test appear as “passing”, while no code has been ran). Many test also need to be updated like yield-test to be properly parametrized tests.

Migration to pytest allowed me to discover a number of issues in our test suite; which was hiding a number of subtle issues – or not actually running some of the tests in our test suite – I have thus corrected many of those; like improperly closed resources; or used of deprecated features. I also made use of the pytest --durations=... to find some of our slowest test and speed them up (our test suite can now be up to 10% faster). Pytest as also a variety of plugins and flags which will make the code quality of IPython and the testing experience better.

Misc¶

We skipped the release of 7.6 at the end of May, but will attempt to get back on schedule. We are starting to think about making introducing backward incompatible change and start the 8.0 series.

Special Thanks to Gabriel (@gpotter2 on GitHub), who among other took care many of the remaining task for 7.4 and 7.5, like updating the website.

IPython 7.5.0¶

IPython 7.5.0 consist mostly of bug-fixes, and documentation updates, with one minor new feature. The Audio display element can now be assigned an element id when displayed in browser. See PR #11670

The major outstanding bug fix correct a change of behavior that was introduce in 7.4.0 where some cell magics would not be able to access or modify global scope when using the @needs_local_scope decorator. This was typically encountered with the %%time and %%timeit magics. See #11659 and PR #11698.

IPython 7.4.0¶

Unicode name completions¶

Previously, we provided completion for a unicode name with its relative symbol. With this, now IPython provides complete suggestions to unicode name symbols.

As on the PR, if user types \LAT<tab>, IPython provides a list of possible completions. In this case, it would be something like:

'LATIN CAPITAL LETTER A',
'LATIN CAPITAL LETTER B',
'LATIN CAPITAL LETTER C',
'LATIN CAPITAL LETTER D',
....

This help to type unicode character that do not have short latex aliases, and have long unicode names. for example Ͱ, \GREEK CAPITAL LETTER HETA.

This feature was contributed by Luciana Marques PR #11583.

Make audio normalization optional¶

Added ‘normalize’ argument to IPython.display.Audio. This argument applies when audio data is given as an array of samples. The default of normalize=True preserves prior behavior of normalizing the audio to the maximum possible range. Setting to False disables normalization.

Miscellaneous¶

Fix improper acceptation of return outside of functions. PR #11641.

Fixed PyQt 5.11 backwards incompatibility causing sip import failure. PR #11613.

Fix Bug where type? would crash IPython. PR #1608.

Allow to apply @needs_local_scope to cell magics for convenience. PR #11542.

IPython 7.3.0¶

IPython 7.3.0 bring several bug fixes and small improvements that you will described bellow.

The biggest change to this release is the implementation of the %conda and %pip magics, that will attempt to install packages in the current environment. You may still need to restart your interpreter or kernel for the change to be taken into account, but it should simplify installation of packages into remote environment. Installing using pip/conda from the command line is still the prefer method.

The %pip magic was already present, but was only printing a warning; now it will actually forward commands to pip.

Misc bug fixes and improvements:

Compatibility with Python 3.8.

Do not expand shell variable in execution magics, and added the no_var_expand decorator for magic requiring a similar functionality PR #11516

Add %pip and %conda magic PR #11524

Re-initialize posix aliases after a %reset PR #11528

Allow the IPython command line to run *.ipynb files PR #11529

IPython 7.2.0¶

IPython 7.2.0 brings minor bugfixes, improvements, and new configuration options:

Fix a bug preventing PySide2 GUI integration from working PR #11464

Run CI on Mac OS ! PR #11471

Fix IPython “Demo” mode. PR #11498

Fix %run magic with path in name PR #11499

Fix: add CWD to sys.path after stdlib PR #11502

Better rendering of signatures, especially long ones. PR #11505

Re-enable jedi by default if it’s installed PR #11506

Add New minimal exception reporting mode (useful for educational purpose). See PR #11509

Added ability to show subclasses when using pinfo and other utilities¶

When using ?/?? on a class, IPython will now list the first 10 subclasses.

Special Thanks to Chris Mentzel of the Moore Foundation for this feature. Chris is one of the people who played a critical role in IPython/Jupyter getting funding.

We are grateful for all the help Chris has given us over the years, and we’re now proud to have code contributed by Chris in IPython.

OSMagics.cd_force_quiet configuration option¶

You can set this option to force the %cd magic to behave as if -q was passed:

In [1]: cd /
/

In [2]: %config OSMagics.cd_force_quiet = True

In [3]: cd /tmp

In [4]:

See PR #11491

In vi editing mode, whether the prompt includes the current vi mode can now be configured¶

Set the TerminalInteractiveShell.prompt_includes_vi_mode to a boolean value (default: True) to control this feature. See PR #11492

IPython 7.1.0¶

IPython 7.1.0 is the first minor release after 7.0.0 and mostly brings fixes to new features, internal refactoring, and fixes for regressions that happened during the 6.x->7.x transition. It also brings Compatibility with Python 3.7.1, as we’re unwillingly relying on a bug in CPython.

New Core Dev:

We welcome Jonathan Slenders to the commiters. Jonathan has done a fantastic work on prompt_toolkit, and we’d like to recognise his impact by giving him commit rights. #11397

Notable Changes

Major update of “latex to unicode” tab completion map (see below)

Notable New Features:

Restore functionality and documentation of the sphinx directive, which is now stricter (fail on error by daefault), has new configuration options, has a brand new documentation page IPython Sphinx Directive (which needs some cleanup). It is also now tested so we hope to have less regressions. PR #11402

IPython.display.Video now supports width and height arguments, allowing a custom width and height to be set instead of using the video’s width and height. PR #11353

Warn when using HTML('<iframe>') instead of IFrame PR #11350

Allow Dynamic switching of editing mode between vi/emacs and show normal/input mode in prompt when using vi. PR #11390. Use %config TerminalInteractiveShell.editing_mode = 'vi' or %config TerminalInteractiveShell.editing_mode = 'emacs' to dynamically switch between modes.

Notable Fixes:

Fix entering of multi-line blocks in terminal IPython, and various crashes in the new input transformation machinery PR #11354, PR #11356, PR #11358. These also fix a Compatibility bug with Python 3.7.1.

Fix moving through generator stack in ipdb PR #11266

%Magic command arguments now support quoting. PR #11330

Re-add rprint and rprinte aliases. PR #11331

Remove implicit dependency on ipython_genutils PR #11317

Make nonlocal raise SyntaxError instead of silently failing in async mode. PR #11382

Fix mishandling of magics and = ! assignment just after a dedent in nested code blocks PR #11418

Fix instructions for custom shortcuts PR #11426

Notable Internals improvements:

Use of os.scandir (Python 3 only) to speed up some file system operations. PR #11365

use perf_counter instead of clock for more precise timing results with %time PR #11376

Many thanks to all the contributors and in particular to bartskowron and tonyfast who handled some pretty complicated bugs in the input machinery. We had a number of first time contributors and maybe hacktoberfest participants that made significant contributions and helped us free some time to focus on more complicated bugs.

You can see all the closed issues and Merged PR, new features and fixes here.

Unicode Completion update¶

In IPython 7.1 the Unicode completion map has been updated and synchronized with the Julia language.

Added and removed character characters:

\jmath (ȷ), \\underleftrightarrow (U+034D, combining) have been added, while \\textasciicaron have been removed

Some sequences have seen their prefix removed:

6 characters \text...<tab> should now be inputed with \...<tab> directly,

45 characters \Elz...<tab> should now be inputed with \...<tab> directly,

65 characters \B...<tab> should now be inputed with \...<tab> directly,

450 characters \m...<tab> should now be inputed with \...<tab> directly,

Some sequences have seen their prefix shortened:

5 characters \mitBbb...<tab> should now be inputed with \bbi...<tab> directly,

52 characters \mit...<tab> should now be inputed with \i...<tab> directly,

216 characters \mbfit...<tab> should now be inputed with \bi...<tab> directly,

222 characters \mbf...<tab> should now be inputed with \b...<tab> directly,

A couple of characters had their sequence simplified:

ð, type \dh<tab>, instead of \eth<tab>

ħ, type \hbar<tab>, instead of \Elzxh<tab>

ɸ, type \ltphi<tab>, instead of \textphi<tab>

ϴ, type \varTheta<tab>, instead of \textTheta<tab>

ℇ, type \eulermascheroni<tab>, instead of \Eulerconst<tab>

ℎ, type \planck<tab>, instead of \Planckconst<tab>

U+0336 (COMBINING LONG STROKE OVERLAY), type \strike<tab>, instead of \Elzbar<tab>.

A couple of sequences have been updated:

\varepsilon now gives ɛ (GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON) instead of ε (GREEK LUNATE EPSILON SYMBOL),

\underbar now gives U+0331 (COMBINING MACRON BELOW) instead of U+0332 (COMBINING LOW LINE).

IPython 7.0.0¶

Released Thursday September 27th, 2018

IPython 7 includes major feature improvements. This is also the second major version of IPython to support only Python 3 – starting at Python 3.4. Python 2 is still community-supported on the bugfix only 5.x branch, but we remind you that Python 2 “end of life” is on Jan 1st 2020.

We were able to backport bug fixes to the 5.x branch thanks to our backport bot which backported more than 70 Pull-Requests, but there are still many PRs that required manual work. This is an area of the project where you can easily contribute by looking for PRs that still need manual backport

The IPython 6.x branch will likely not see any further release unless critical bugs are found.

Make sure you have pip > 9.0 before upgrading. You should be able to update by running:

pip install ipython --upgrade

If you are trying to install or update an alpha, beta, or rc version, use pip --pre flag.

pip install ipython --upgrade --pre

Or, if you have conda installed:

conda install ipython

Prompt Toolkit 2.0¶

IPython 7.0+ now uses prompt_toolkit 2.0. If you still need to use an earlier prompt_toolkit version, you may need to pin IPython to <7.0.

Autowait: Asynchronous REPL¶

Staring with IPython 7.0 on Python 3.6+, IPython can automatically await top level code. You should not need to access an event loop or runner yourself. To learn more, read the Asynchronous in REPL: Autoawait section of our docs, see PR #11265, or try the following code:

Python 3.6.0
Type 'copyright', 'credits' or 'license' for more information
IPython 7.0.0 -- An enhanced Interactive Python. Type '?' for help.

In [1]: import aiohttp
   ...: result = aiohttp.get('https://api.github.com')

In [2]: response = await result
<pause for a few 100s ms>

In [3]: await response.json()
Out[3]:
{'authorizations_url': 'https://api.github.com/authorizations',
 'code_search_url': 'https://api.github.com/search/code?q={query}{&page,per_page,sort,order}',
...
}

Note

Async integration is experimental code, behavior may change or be removed between Python and IPython versions without warnings.

Integration is by default with asyncio, but other libraries can be configured – like curio or trio – to improve concurrency in the REPL:

In [1]: %autoawait trio

In [2]: import trio

In [3]: async def child(i):
   ...:     print("   child %s goes to sleep"%i)
   ...:     await trio.sleep(2)
   ...:     print("   child %s wakes up"%i)

In [4]: print('parent start')
   ...: async with trio.open_nursery() as n:
   ...:     for i in range(3):
   ...:         n.spawn(child, i)
   ...: print('parent end')
parent start
   child 2 goes to sleep
   child 0 goes to sleep
   child 1 goes to sleep
   <about 2 seconds pause>
   child 2 wakes up
   child 1 wakes up
   child 0 wakes up
parent end

See Asynchronous in REPL: Autoawait for more information.

Asynchronous code in a Notebook interface or any other frontend using the Jupyter Protocol will require further updates to the IPykernel package.

Non-Asynchronous code¶

As the internal API of IPython is now asynchronous, IPython needs to run under an event loop. In order to allow many workflows, (like using the %run magic, or copy-pasting code that explicitly starts/stop event loop), when top-level code is detected as not being asynchronous, IPython code is advanced via a pseudo-synchronous runner, and may not advance pending tasks.

Change to Nested Embed¶

The introduction of the ability to run async code had some effect on the IPython.embed() API. By default, embed will not allow you to run asynchronous code unless an event loop is specified.

Effects on Magics¶

Some magics will not work with async until they’re updated. Contributions welcome.

Expected Future changes¶

We expect more internal but public IPython functions to become async, and will likely end up having a persistent event loop while IPython is running.

Thanks¶

This release took more than a year in the making. The code was rebased a number of times; leading to commit authorship that may have been lost in the final Pull-Request. Huge thanks to many people for contribution, discussion, code, documentation, use-cases: dalejung, danielballan, ellisonbg, fperez, gnestor, minrk, njsmith, pganssle, tacaswell, takluyver , vidartf … And many others.

Autoreload Improvement¶

The magic %autoreload 2 now captures new methods added to classes. Earlier, only methods existing as of the initial import were being tracked and updated.

This new feature helps dual environment development - Jupyter+IDE - where the code gradually moves from notebook cells to package files as it gets structured.

Example: An instance of the class MyClass will be able to access the method cube() after it is uncommented and the file file1.py is saved on disk.

# notebook

from mymodule import MyClass
first = MyClass(5)

# mymodule/file1.py

class MyClass:

    def __init__(self, a=10):
        self.a = a

    def square(self):
        print('compute square')
        return self.a*self.a

    # def cube(self):
    #     print('compute cube')
    #     return self.a*self.a*self.a

Misc¶

The autoindent feature that was deprecated in 5.x was re-enabled and un-deprecated in PR #11257

Make %run -n -i ... work correctly. Earlier, if %run was passed both arguments, -n would be silently ignored. See PR #10308

The %%script (as well as %%bash, %%ruby… ) cell magics now raise by default if the return code of the given code is non-zero (thus halting execution of further cells in a notebook). The behavior can be disable by passing the --no-raise-error flag.

Deprecations¶

A couple of unused functions and methods have been deprecated and will be removed in future versions:

IPython.utils.io.raw_print_err

IPython.utils.io.raw_print

Backwards incompatible changes¶

The API for transforming input before it is parsed as Python code has been completely redesigned: any custom input transformations will need to be rewritten. See Custom input transformation for details of the new API.