How to get an ipython graphical console on Windows

Question

Where can I find step-by-step instructions to install the modules required by ipython qtconsole in Windows 7 (64-bit)?

(Sorry for the brevity of this question. It would take literally hours for me to write down all the things I have attempted, and nearly as long for anyone to read it. I'll just note that everything that I have found even remotely related to pyqt4 seems extremely Unix-specific, with at most a cursory nod at what Windows users may try...)

Answer 1

I have a similar use case and wrote some helper batch scripts to deploy Miniconda, a stripped down version of the Anaconda Python distribution by continuum.io.
It also installs packages that I need, such as IPython for ipython qtconsole.
You can easily customize these scripts to suit your needs. They're for Windows x86_64 but can be configured for 32bit x86 as well.

Answer 2

I bought the Conceptive Engineering Python Stack. I give it a 6 out of 10 (for 50 USD). It does ship with many great binaries (QtConsole and friends included) and is geared for rapid Python+QT application development. It also covers some networking/web modules that are nice to have, all with a pretty good Windows installer (32-bit py platform).

I too am on 64bit Windows 7, and thats part of the reason I mark then down a little. A few of the packages are glitchy out of the box (tkinter was broken OUT-OF-BOX! but only on 64bit system). The thing with these guys (from belgium i think), the QT+Python "development suite" is really all they intend to deliver (luckily that includes a quite functional, albeit slightly dated IPython deployment).

The worst part is support (oh sure, they have $300 dollar 1-day class in germany). I don't expect emergency 24hour-phone service for $50, but they don't even ship a decent Readme, negligible website support docs; doesn't even have a package summary list of what they just slapped on your system. Feels like they ship you a big tarball, and if the applications they post on your start-menu don't satisfy your needs, get ready to go digging in your PYTHONPATH. Email support was shotty as well.

Although, I still havn't ditched it, the number of Qt4 related programs are pretty useful and hard to get done with other python deployments.

For what is worth...

Answer 3

On Windows, the 32-bit version of EPD is free; it runs fine on Win7-64, though of course with a 32-bit address space. This EPD installer include ipython 0.12.1, which suffices for qtconsole. To update it to ipython 0.13.1 (important for ipython notebook), use the EPD command "enpkg ipython" (details here).

Answer 4

After installing and adding Python paths to your Environment Variables:

Open Windows command line (cmd.exe) and run:

pip install ipython[all]

or as recommended by official site:

pip install qtconsole

After pip finished installing all the packages, you can start the ipython qtconsole by running:

ipython qtconsole

or

jupyter qtconsole

Answer 5

I would suggest using a full package distribution like EPD (http://www.enthought.com/products/epd_free.php), which should work out of the box.

Otherwise the dependencies are

ZeroMQ, pyzmq, PySide or PyQt, and pygments,

And unfortunately we don't have enough users using windows to improve the install docs.