Hi. The purpose of this post is to give you a heads-up about using the Mac version of PyCharm to develop Python apps.
After 30+ years developing applications using Windows workstations, six months ago I got a new MacBook Pro to replace my Windows workstation. Overall, it's great for traditional Mac applications (writing, and video, photo, and music editing). For software development, it's not recommended.
Using PyCharm on a couple Windows systems has been great. Unfortunately, the Mac version of Pycharm has some serious issues. For several months, I've encountered some strange PyCharm/Python issues - especially with plotting libraries. For example...
In frustration, I finally pulled my PC workstation off of my digital piano and hooked it up to my dev monitors for Python development. As a long-time professional developer, one very handy feature of any development tool (Visual Studio, VS Code, PyCharm, etc) is to have the IDE create a function stub from a function call for a non-existent function definition. This helps you stay focused and in the "zone". I.e. lay out the overall code and then fill in the function details later.
On PyCharm Mac, this feature is pretty much non-existent. I.e. if you right-click on a function call there is no way to create that function stub.
On PyCharm PC, it works exactly as expected. I.e. right-clicking on a function and then selecting "Show Context Actions" shows a pop-up that includes "Create function '<function name>". Clicking that creates a perfect function stub. I.e. works perfectly.
Going forward, I'm modifying my app's code to work on my PC.
My message here is: Buying a Mac for traditional Mac applications is fine. But for Python development... Stick with a Windows system!
Best of luck,
Dan.
p.s. PyCharm Mac customer support is very frustrating. As a PyCharm Pro subscriber for the last two years, their PyCharm PC support has been excellent. For PyCharm Mac, it seems that people either do not have a Mac or are not trained on a Mac. Instead of providing concise feedback, you get multiple, inconsistent responses. Very frustrating.
After 30+ years developing applications using Windows workstations, six months ago I got a new MacBook Pro to replace my Windows workstation. Overall, it's great for traditional Mac applications (writing, and video, photo, and music editing). For software development, it's not recommended.
Using PyCharm on a couple Windows systems has been great. Unfortunately, the Mac version of Pycharm has some serious issues. For several months, I've encountered some strange PyCharm/Python issues - especially with plotting libraries. For example...
In frustration, I finally pulled my PC workstation off of my digital piano and hooked it up to my dev monitors for Python development. As a long-time professional developer, one very handy feature of any development tool (Visual Studio, VS Code, PyCharm, etc) is to have the IDE create a function stub from a function call for a non-existent function definition. This helps you stay focused and in the "zone". I.e. lay out the overall code and then fill in the function details later.
On PyCharm Mac, this feature is pretty much non-existent. I.e. if you right-click on a function call there is no way to create that function stub.
On PyCharm PC, it works exactly as expected. I.e. right-clicking on a function and then selecting "Show Context Actions" shows a pop-up that includes "Create function '<function name>". Clicking that creates a perfect function stub. I.e. works perfectly.
Going forward, I'm modifying my app's code to work on my PC.
My message here is: Buying a Mac for traditional Mac applications is fine. But for Python development... Stick with a Windows system!
Best of luck,
Dan.
p.s. PyCharm Mac customer support is very frustrating. As a PyCharm Pro subscriber for the last two years, their PyCharm PC support has been excellent. For PyCharm Mac, it seems that people either do not have a Mac or are not trained on a Mac. Instead of providing concise feedback, you get multiple, inconsistent responses. Very frustrating.