Tick the checkboxes where you can relate:
- PyCharm is great but I miss VS Code lightness and customizability. Let's try to configure it.
- I have just configured VS Code for Python development but intellisense/autocomplete/suggestions are not working as expected.
- I have watched a lot of YouTube videos and read a lot of articles but it's still not working. I'm missing PyCharm...
If you can relate to any of the above, you are in the right place! I have found a solution that works for me. I hope it works for you too.
Disclaimer 1: I won't be covering the installation of Python or VS Code. I assume you have them installed 👌
Disclaimer 2: I have decided to not mention extensions that haven't been updated in over 3 years.
Disclaimer 3: I am not a professional developer. I am a Product Manager who codes. This guide is a result of my personal experience. It works for me and I hope it works for you too! 🤜🤛 (suggestions are welcome!)
By default, to open the settings file, press Ctrl + Shift + P (or cmd + Shift + P) and type Open User Settings (JSON). Then, paste the following settings:
"editor.formatOnSave": true,
"editor.formatOnSaveMode": "file",
"editor.codeActionsOnSave": {
"source.organizeImports": "explicit"
},(In this guide, I might have not listed some settings that are already well configured by default)
2 - Python Official extension (link)
"python.defaultInterpreterPath": "python3",
"python.languageServer": "Pylance", // VERY IMPORTANT! Please recheck this setting after installing Pylance.
"python.analysis.typeCheckingMode": "basic",
"python.analysis.diagnosticMode": "workspace",
"python.analysis.completeFunctionParens": true, // I regret not enabling this setting earlier...
"python.analysis.indexing": true,
"python.analysis.autoImportCompletions": true3 - Pylance Official extension (link)
Developed by Microsoft, Pylance is a language server for Python that gives me a great experience when developing FastAPI projects in VS Code (I don't know why it only has 3 stars on the marketplace...).
"python.languageServer": "Pylance"4 - Ruff: Python linter and formatter written in Rust (link)
Benchmark results of Ruff against other Python linters showed by the author:
I used to utilize Pylint alongside black, isort, and flake8, but I've swapped them out for ruff which re-implements the latter three in Rust (check the FAQ for more details).
💯 Pylance and Ruff are the two main reasons why I don't feel the need go back to PyCharm anymore. The auto-complete and error checking just work perfectly, especially when Python's type hints are used. 💯
I use Ruff's default configuration and with some other rules:
# .pyproject.toml
[tool.ruff.lint]
select = ["E4", "E7", "E9", "F", "I001", "S"] # I've added "I001" and "S" to the default rulesI001 rule replaces isort and S rules replace flake8-bandit package (optional).
I use Pipenv almost for all my projects, I add Ruff in my Pipfile as a dev dependency. It should be the same with Poetry.
5 - Ruff Official extension (link)
This extension is a wrapper around the Ruff formatter. It's a must-have if you want to use Ruff in VS Code.
Add the path to the Ruff binary in your settings. If you have globally installed Ruff via Homebrew, you would need to add the following settings:
"ruff.path": [
"/opt/homebrew/bin/ruff"
],6 - Python Debugger Official extension (link)
If you don't know what's a debugger, you should definitely check it out!
If you miss PyCharm's inlay hints, you can enable them in VS Code with Pylance extension by adding the following settings:
"python.analysis.inlayHints.callArgumentNames": "all",
"python.analysis.inlayHints.functionReturnTypes": true,
"python.analysis.inlayHints.pytestParameters": true,
"python.analysis.inlayHints.variableTypes": true,8 - Error Lens extension (link)
Inspired by Atom (rip), Error Lens is a great extension that highlights errors and warnings inline in your code. If VS Code error squiggles are not enough for you, you should definitely give it a look.
I only use default settings for this extension.