How can I make PyDev autoformat the maximum number of characters per line?

Question

I am using PyDev for Python programming in Eclipse.

Is it possible to make PyDev auto-format my code to limit the maximum number of characters on a single line?

Answer 1

With standard PyDev

It seems that this option is only available in Eclipse's Java Editor.

The Java editor allows you to create "profiles" for the code formatter, while PyDev's options for the code formatter are very limited.

However,

You can hack this. PythonTidy.py is an awesome script that cleans up Python code to make it follow PEP8 conventions, and that can be tweaked with your own settings.

PythonTidy (code cleanup & formatting)

Get here (homepage) the source for PythonTidy.

You will see inside the file, at the beginning of the code and just after the comments, that many settings are defined.

The first one of these is COL_LIMIT with its default value set to 72. Now you can use PythonTidy to format your code the way you want.

Integration with PyDev

Now you have to make this work with PyDev's formatting. This blog post will explain it really better than me, but still I'll sum up the steps :

• Write a Jython interface betwenn PyDev's editor (PyEdit) and PythonTidy. This blog's author already wrote a wrapper script in the public domain available in the above link or here in case the link goes 404.
• Save this file anywhere you want, with the name pyedit_pythontidy.py, along with the PythonTidy.py file.

• Configure PyDev to use this script as its Code Formatter. You can do this in Preferences > PyDev > Scripting PyDev

  • Note #1: I really recommend reading the original blog post to have a better understanding

  • Note #2: The wrapper script author did not implement Code Block formatting, so this means you can only format a full file. This should not be that hard to implement, up to you.

  • Note #3: All credits goes to bear330 for the PyDev integration part.