How to use DataSpell
Jupyter Notebook is a great tool for data scientists, however, you miss awesome features of IDE while using it. I have been using IDE from JetBrains for a long time. Tools from JetBrains have been the first choice in most cases and recently I have been using Dataspell I am liking the many features it has to offer and there might be many to come.
Features I liked the most
- Easy way to select and change environments
- Shortcuts of Intellij on notebook (eg: Alt+J for find and select)
- Clear and concise Matplotlib images
- Easily inspect all dataframe values like in spreadsheet
- Feature to debug
Installation
Similar to other JetBrains tools it is very easy to install. if you have other than Linux environment check here
sudo snap install dataspell --classic
Execution
You can search for “dataspell” in the search bar if you don’t find use the command below and you can create entrypoint for future.
dataspell
You can select the environment of your choice and you also can change it later. I am selecting Virtualenv for now. It also provides a quick tour after you click launch Dataspell. However, I am going to explain a few features here. By clicking the button shown below you can select the existing notebook directory.
This is what your workspace looks like after you select your notebook to work on. And yes you can see all of the features you have on the jupyter notebook.
The feature I liked the most from dataspell is, that you can print all dataframe and it will show a small portion of it. To see all of the data, you can open a new tab and it will show data like you are seeing it in excel.
Did I mention that it supports debugging too? Yes, you read it right, it supports debugging. I never thought about having to debug the feature on a notebook. I use debugging almost every time during software development and sometimes I feel like I am exploiting it and now I can do it on notebooks too. I think this is going to save a lot of time for developers.I think it is still on early stage and I have encountered few bugs as well, Sometime whole is missing the execution and it is being skipped.
These are all I wanted to write about dataspell. Thanks for reading.
