12. Updating the Python Doc Strings¶
Note
We are still refining this procedure!
The Python doc strings for most functions in VisIt’s scripting interface are generated from the examples embedded in the python_scripting/functions.rst
file.
This allows us to have a single source for both our scripting interface sphinx docs and the doc strings embedded in VisIt’s compiled Python module.
The functions_to_method_doc.py
helper script generates MethodDoc.C
from the examples embedded in the rst source.
The Python doc strings for Attribute objects and Events are extracted from the scripting interface for use in the Python scripting sphinx docs.
The sphinx_cli_extractor.py
runs VisIt to generate python_scripting/attributes.rst
and python_scripting/events.rst
.
12.1. Steps to update the Python scripting manual¶
Modify
python_scripting/functions.rst
.Run
functions_to_plain_py.py
to generatePY_RST_FUNCTIONS_TO_PYTHON.py
.Run
2to3 -p PY_RST_FUNCTIONS_TO_PYTHON.py
to check for Python syntax errors and Python 3 compatibly.- NOTE:
PY_RST_FUNCTIONS_TO_PYTHON.py
is just a temporary file to test steps 2 and 3 here. It could be named anything and is not part of the repository. - NOTE:
2to3
will run to completion and issue a number of messages. A zero return code indicates all is well.
- NOTE:
Run
functions_to_method_doc.py
to regenerateMethodDoc.C
.Build and run the VisIt scripting interface and assure yourself
help(<your-new-func-doc>)
produces the desired output.Run the
sphinx_cli_extractor.py
tool producing newattributes.rst
andevents.rst
files. To do so, you may need to use a combination of thePATH
andPYTHONPATH
environment variables to tell thesphinx_cli_extractor.py
script where to find the VisIt module,visit
in VisIt’ssite-packages
and where to find the Python installation that that module is expecting to run with. In addition, you may need to use thePYTHONHOME
environment variable to tell VisIt’svisit
module where to find standard Python libraries. For example, to use an installed version of VisIt on my macOS machine, the command would look like…env PATH=/Applications/VisIt.app/Contents/Resources/2.13.3/darwin-x86_64/bin:/Applications/VisIt.app/Contents/Resources/bin:$PATH \ PYTHONHOME=/Applications/VisIt.app//Contents/Resources/2.13.3/darwin-x86_64/lib/python \ PYTHONPATH=/Applications/VisIt.app/Contents/Resources/2.13.3/darwin-x86_64/lib/site-packages \ ./sphinx_cli_extractor.py
Note that the above command would produce CLI documentation for version 2.13.3 of VisIt. Or, to use a current build of VisIt on which you are working on documentation related to changes you have made to VisIt, the command would look something like…
env PATH=/Users/miller86/visit/third_party/3.2.0/python/3.7.7/i386-apple-darwin18_clang/bin:/Users/miller86/visit/visit/build/bin:$PATH \ PYTHONPATH=../../build/lib/site-packages python3 ./sphinx_cli_extractor.py
The whole process only takes a few seconds.
Assuming you successfully ran the above command, producing new
attributes.rst
andevents.rst
files, then do a local build of the documentation here and confirm there are no errors in the build.sphinx-build -b html . _build -a
Then open the file,
_build/index.html
, in your favorite browser to view.Add all the changed files to a commit and push to GitHub.
The GitHub integration with ReadTheDocs should result in your documentation updates going live a short while (<15 mins) after it has been merged to develop.