Installation
pip install ipython[notebook]
or
pip install ipython[all]
NB: I had trouble installing and needed to upgrade my version of pip
More info: http://ipython.org/install.html
Commands
ipython notebook
- it runs in the background
- it opens in your browser
- opens a listing of programs in the same folder
What can it do
Each notebook can be divided into different cells
- a markdown cell for documentation or introductions
- code cells, can run even run other installed languages such as Perl, Ruby
- easy to edit multiple lines of code
- cells share variable scope
- can also run a limited set of local shell commands e.g. capturing shell command output in a variable
x = !ls ..;
- can display HTML in cells
Use cases
Individual exploration
- play with external data
- easy to tweak and see output in situ
Suggestions from the audience
- can use to iterate to play with rewriting code in CPython, as you can see results side by side
Collaboration
- very readable
- self contained
- you can share .ipynb files
- you can host a server yourself. WARNING there is shell access! So not suitable for pubic access.
Suggestions
- SageMathCloud: provides a FREE hosted service, which has been extended to for asynchronous use (e.g. for google docs like collaboration) and for git snap shots
- PythonAnywhere
Publishing
- nbviewer serves read only notebooks, nbviewer.ipython.org – is like gist for notebooks
- can export as HTML, python scripts, various other formats including as presentations
Overall
Our speaker, Gautier Hayoun, wanted to implore that iPython Notebook was for everyone, not only data scientists. It tells a story of your data processing. Or if can be used to parse server logs or other data for ad hoc queries.
An interesting talk and a fine moustache ;)