[IPython-user] Using ipython as a bash replacement

[Fernando Perez]

Jonathan Daugherty wrote:

> I had an idea [and I don't know if it has already been proposed].
> Toward the goal of using ipython in a more shellish context, I think
> it would be really useful if ipython would treat any non-pythonic
> stuff as a shell command; so, if you enter a command or something, and
> it cannot resolve it as something pythonic or magical, perhaps it
> would then default to running it on the system level.  So, if I enter
> something like
> 
> In [56]: emacs
> 
> and 'emacs' is not magical and is not in the python namespace, ipython
> might run it as a fallback.  I know this might be potentially
> dangerous, but it's just an idea.  Any thoughts?

Something like this could be implemented via a profile.  Have a look at the 
special input processing examples:

http://ipython.scipy.org/doc/manual/node11.html

However, it will _never_ be the default behavior, since it would potentially 
hide python syntax errors from the users.  However, the profile mechanism, and 
the fact that tha input processing hooks are user-available, makes it possible 
to implement this as an optional 'personality' for ipython.

If you get a working profile of this kind, I'll be happy to host it on the 
public site.  However, I won't work myself in this direction.  I am already 
way behind with ipython work in terms of bugfixes and core changes which are 
directly relevant to its pure python functionality, I simply don't have the 
time to compete with bash and tcsh :-)

If you or other users develop such functionality, once it matures I'd be 
equally happy to incoroporate it in the distribution (the code has to be LGPL 
or Python-license compatible).  I say this just to emphasize that I don't 
oppose the idea in any way, I simply don't have the resources or interest to 
do it myself.

Regards,

Fernando.