Scripting Window¶

Overview¶

The scripting window allows you to write and execute Python scripts that interact with the Mantid Python API. It can be accessed either by selecting the Script Window option from the View menu in MantidPlot or by pressing F3.

Editor Options¶

The general options for the script editor are controlled using the Edit and Window menus.

Alongside the standard text copy and paste tools the Edit menu has tools that help format Python code, all of these tools can operate over a subsection of the code which is selected by highlighting it in the editor.

Comment

Comments out the selected lines or the current line if no code is highlighted.

Uncomment

Uncomments the selected lines or or the current line if no code is highlighted.

Tabs to Spaces

Converts any tabs in the current selection (or the entire script if no code is highlighted) to spaces.

Spaces to Tabs

Converts any spaces in the current selection (or the entire script if no code is highlighted) to tabs.

The Window menu contains options relating to the way in which code is displayed in the editor:

Always On Top

Enabling this option ensures that the scripting windows will stay above all other windows.

Progress Reporting

This option enables the green arrow which points to the current line being executed on the left hand side of the editor.

Code Folding

This option adds fold markers next to the line numbers on the right hand side of the editor which allow blocks of code to be collapsed based on their indentation levels.

Show Whitespace

This option is used to show the whitespace in the editor window, this can be very useful for finding indentation issues.

Configure Tabs

This dialog is used to edit the way in which tabs are converted to and from spaces by the Tabs to Spaces and Spaces to Tabs tools as well as how stabs are displayed in the editor window. It is recommended to leave these settings set to enable Replace tabs with spaces and Number of spaces per tab set to 4.

Execution Options¶

The Execution menu contains options regarding the execution of the script, the two main options here are Execute All and Execute Selection.

Execute All

This option will execute the entire script from the top down in the standard way a Python script would be executed.

Execute Selection

This option allows selection of a subset of the code to be executed, this is selected by highlighting the lines you wish to execute in the editor window and selecting the option.

Note that when using the Execute Selection option you must have the entire line selected as the code is taken from the first highlighted character to the last. For this reason there is also a limitation that prevents you from executing a selection where the first line is indented at any level as this will generate an indentation warning from the Python interpreter since it is effectively seeing an indented block where it would not expect to.

The Clear Variables option is used to clear the local variables in the current script, this is usually not something that would need to be done as it is done automatically before each execution of a script.

The Mode option allows you to switch between running the script asynchronously or serialised with the UI, typically running scripts serialised is not recommended as you will lose control of the MantidPlot UI whilst the script is being executed.

Script Output¶

The output pane at the bottom of the window displays the output from the script in the current tab, this shows the times execution of the script has started and finished as well as anything output from the script using print statements.

Right clicking on the output pane opens the context menu which allows you to export the output in multiple ways as well as clearing the window.

Category: Interfaces