Autoreload of modules in IPython

Question

Is there a way to have IPython automatically reload all changed code? Either before each line is executed in the shell or failing that when it is specifically requested to. I’m doing a lot of exploratory programming using IPython and SciPy and it’s quite a pain to have to manually reload each module whenever I change it.

Asked By: Thomas Parslow

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Source

Answer 1

There is an extension for that, but I have no usage experience yet:

http://ipython.scipy.org/ipython/ipython/attachment/ticket/154/ipy_autoreload.py

Answered By: miku

Answer 2

REVISED – please see Andrew_1510’s answer below, as IPython has been updated.

…

It was a bit hard figure out how to get there from a dusty bug report, but:

It ships with IPython now!

import ipy_autoreload
%autoreload 2
%aimport your_mod

# %autoreload? for help

… then every time you call your_mod.dwim(), it’ll pick up the latest version.

Answered By: Mike McCabe

Answer 3

For IPython version 3.1, 4.x, and 5.x

%load_ext autoreload
%autoreload 2

Then your module will be auto-reloaded by default. This is the doc:

File:       ...my/python/path/lib/python2.7/site-packages/IPython/extensions/autoreload.py

Docstring:
``autoreload`` is an IPython extension that reloads modules
automatically before executing the line of code typed.

This makes for example the following workflow possible:

.. sourcecode:: ipython

   In [1]: %load_ext autoreload

   In [2]: %autoreload 2

   In [3]: from foo import some_function

   In [4]: some_function()
   Out[4]: 42

   In [5]: # open foo.py in an editor and change some_function to return 43

   In [6]: some_function()
   Out[6]: 43

The module was reloaded without reloading it explicitly, and the
object imported with ``from foo import ...`` was also updated.

There is a trick: when you forget all of the above when using ipython, just try:

import autoreload
?autoreload
# Then you get all the above

Answered By: Andrew_1510

Answer 4

As mentioned above, you need the autoreload extension. If you want it to automatically start every time you launch ipython, you need to add it to the ipython_config.py startup file:

It may be necessary to generate one first:

ipython profile create

Then include these lines in ~/.ipython/profile_default/ipython_config.py:

c.InteractiveShellApp.exec_lines = []
c.InteractiveShellApp.exec_lines.append('%load_ext autoreload')
c.InteractiveShellApp.exec_lines.append('%autoreload 2')

As well as an optional warning in case you need to take advantage of compiled Python code in .pyc files:

c.InteractiveShellApp.exec_lines.append('print("Warning: disable autoreload in ipython_config.py to improve performance.")')

edit: the above works with version 0.12.1 and 0.13

Answered By: kara deniz

Answer 5

You can use:

  import ipy_autoreload
  %autoreload 2 
  %aimport your_mod

Answered By: dongweiming

Answer 6

If you add file ipython_config.py into the ~/.ipython/profile_default directory with lines like below, then the autoreload functionality will be loaded on IPython startup (tested on 2.0.0):

print "--------->>>>>>>> ENABLE AUTORELOAD <<<<<<<<<------------"

c = get_config()
c.InteractiveShellApp.exec_lines = []
c.InteractiveShellApp.exec_lines.append('%load_ext autoreload')
c.InteractiveShellApp.exec_lines.append('%autoreload 2')

Answered By: lowtech

Autoreload of modules in IPython

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