How do I set the default file path in ipython on OSX

Question

I am just getting started trying to learn Python for course assignments. Our teacher has mandated using iPython notebooks, so I have installed Enthought Python AND ipython on my Mac.

The iPython home directory is /users/me/.ipython

I have used the ipython profile create command to create the file

.ipython/profile_default/ipython_config.py

but I don't know how to access this file or what to put in it. My objective is to set the default file path to:

/users/me/documents/classes/analytics/hw1

so that code in my ipython notebook will automatically know where to look for data files.

Please help!

Answer 1

You can change the default path to your notebook files. Search in ipython_notebook_config.py for a setting notebook_dir.

The default folder for accessing files is the folder that your notebook is in. If you need to change that, then at the start of the notebook, add a command like this:

%cd /users/me/documents/classes/analytics/hw1

• prooffreader: I'll just leave this comment hear for future searchers: if you can't find a file named ipython_notebook_config.py, it means you are using the default profile with no customizations. You can continue to use the default profile, but create a config file you can edit, by typing the following at the system command prompt: ipython profile create