IPython 7.0 releases with AsyncIO Integration and new Async libraries

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IPython team released version 7.0 of IPython, yesterday. IPython is a powerful Python interactive shell with features such as advanced tab completion, syntactic coloration, and more. IPython 7.0 explores new features such as AsyncIO integration, new Async libraries, and Async support in Notebooks.

IPython (Interactive Python) provides a rich toolkit for interactive computing in multiple programming languages. It’s the Jupyter kernel for Python used by millions of users.

Let’s discuss the key features in IPython 7.0 release.

AsyncIO Integration

IPython 7.0 comes with the integration of IPython and AsyncIO. This means that you don’t have to import or learn about asyncIO anymore. AsyncIO is a library which lets you write concurrent code using the async/await syntax.

The asyncIO library is used as a foundation for multiple Python asynchronous frameworks providing high-performance network, web-servers, database connection libraries, distributed task queues, etc.

Just remember that asyncIO is an async function, it won’t magically make your code faster but will make it easier to write.

New Async Libraries (Curio and Trio integration)

Python consists of keywords async and await. This helps simplify the use of asynchronous programming and the standardization around asyncIO. It also allows experimentation with the new paradigms for asynchronous libraries.

Now, two new Async Libraries namely Curio and Trio, have been added in IPython 7.0. Both of these libraries explore ways to write asynchronous programs. They also explore how to use async, awaits, and coroutines when starting from a blank slate.

Curio is a library which helps perform concurrent I/O and common system programming tasks. It makes use of the Python coroutines and the explicit async/await syntax. Trio is an async/await-native I/O library for Python. It lets you write programs that do multiple things at the same time with parallelized I/O.

Async support in Notebooks

Async code will now work in a notebook when using ipykernel for Jupyter users. With IPython 7.0, async will work with all the frontends that support the Jupyter Protocol, including the classic Notebook, JupyterLab, Hydrogen, nteract desktop, and nteract web. The default code will run in the existing asyncIO/tornado loop that runs the kernel.

For more information, check out the official release notes.