We're excited to announce that the March 2023 release of the Python and Jupyter extensions for Visual Studio Code is now available!
This release includes the following improvements:
- Back button and cancel functionality added to create environment command
- isort no longer ships with the Python extension by default
- Improvements to Kernel Selection in Jupyter Notebooks
- Python for VS Code Team on Python Pulse
If you're interested, you can check out the full list of improvements to the Python , Jupyter , and Pylance extensions in our changelog .
Back button and cancel functionality added to create environment command
In this release, we've added functionality that allows you to Back or Cancel when using the Python: Create Environment command. This change will allow you to go back to a previous step to change the environment creation or cancel it entirely with a key or button. This enhancement has been applied to all Create Environment UIs and will appear in the Jupyter extension.
isort no longer ships with the Python extension by default
We've been listening to community feedback and have heard requests to reduce the number of extensions that are installed by default with Python extensions. We also want to make sure that extensions created by the community are treated equally compared to any extensions we provide as a team, for example people think the Ruff extension is for import sorting. Subsequently, starting with this release, isort is no longer installed by default with the Python extension.
The isort extension can still be downloaded from the marketplace to opt-in to the functionality it provides.
Improvements to Kernel Selection in Jupyter Notebooks
When selecting a kernel in Jupyter notebook, the selector now shows the most recently used kernel by default. This is a convenient change from the previous behavior, as it was used to display all available cores. When you have the latest Jupyter and Python extensions installed, you can still view all available kernels via the secondary selector "Choose another kernel..." which will sort all Kernels are grouped.
Other changes and enhancements
We've also added some minor enhancements and fixes to user-requested issues that should improve your experience with Python and Jupyter Notebooks in Visual Studio Code. Some notable changes include:
- Improved IntelliSense support for Pylance's pytest is now previewed and available in this latest release.
- For Python files, this setting is now enabled by default, making Pylance auto-indentation available to everyone . The editor.formatOnType setting is now enabled by default for Python files, which makes auto-indentation with Pylance available to everyone.
- The Jupyter extension now supports IPyWidgets version 8.
- Improvements to the interactive window kernel selection for the Jupyter extension. The currently active interpreter will be used unless another kernel was previously selected for interactive windows in this workspace.
We would also like to give a special thanks to this month's contributors:
- @satya-vinay made their first contribution in (vscode-flake8#76)
- @mitchell-as made their first contribution in (vscode-python#20534)
- @JCMais made their first contribution in (vscode-python#20741)
Try these new improvements by updating or downloading the Python extension and Jupyter extension from the Marketplace, or installing them directly from the Extensions view in Visual Studio Code (Ctrl+Shift+X or ⌘+⇧+X). You can learn more about Visual Studio Code Python in the documentation . If you run into any issues or have suggestions, please file an issue on the Python VS Code GitHub page , or leave a comment below this article. Thanks!