Autoreload

[mileslucas]

This is a feature request

I've recently been doing a lot of coding two packages in Julia and python side-by-side and have been sorely missing the %autoreload 2 magic from ipython. Is this something that can be incorporated into PyCall? The ideal usage I could image is something like

using PyCall
autoreload()

[stevengj]

I think you could use IPython itself for this, at least from IJulia. Something like:

autoreload = pyimport("IPython.extensions.autoreload").AutoreloadMagics()
IJulia.push_preexecute_hook(() -> autoreload.pre_run_cell())
IJulia.push_postexecute_hook(() -> autoreload.post_execute_hook())

[mileslucas]

I'll give that a try! I'm curious, though, if we can get the same functionality for use on the command line too. Our REPL is much closer to ipython REPL than the python REPL, so if we can make it work without having to use IJulia, that would be awesome!

[stevengj]

Yes, in Julia 1.5 you can use the new REPL AST transformation feature to push a transformation that calls the IPython AutoreloadMagics pre/post execute hooks before the code that is executed.

This is very similar to what Revise.jl does. See timholy/Revise.jl#425

[stevengj]

If you get this to work, I would suggest putting it in a PyRevise.jl package (analogous to Revise.jl), so that people who want this could run using PyRevise (or put that in their Julia startup files).

[mileslucas]

Sounds good! I'll go ahead and close this considering your point about the auxiliary package. Thanks!