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<div class="section" id="module-rlcompleter">
<span id="rlcompleter-adds-tab-completion-to-the-interactive-interpreter"></span><h1>rlcompleter – Adds tab-completion to the interactive interpreter<a class="headerlink" href="#module-rlcompleter" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h1>
<table class="docutils field-list" frame="void" rules="none">
<col class="field-name" />
<col class="field-body" />
<tbody valign="top">
<tr class="field"><th class="field-name">Purpose:</th><td class="field-body">Adds tab-completion to the interactive interpreter</td>
</tr>
<tr class="field"><th class="field-name">Python Version:</th><td class="field-body">1.5 and later</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p><a class="reference internal" href="#module-rlcompleter" title="rlcompleter: Adds tab-completion to the interactive interpreter"><tt class="xref py py-mod docutils literal"><span class="pre">rlcompleter</span></tt></a> adds tab-completion for Python symbols to the
interactive interpreter. Importing the module causes it to configure
a completer function for <a class="reference internal" href="../readline/index.html#module-readline" title="readline: Interface to the GNU readline library"><tt class="xref py py-mod docutils literal"><span class="pre">readline</span></tt></a>. The only other step
required is to configure the tab key to trigger the completer. All of
this can be done in a <a class="reference external" href="http://docs.python.org/using/cmdline.html#envvar-PYTHONSTARTUP">PYTHONSTARTUP</a>
file so that it runs each time the interactive interpreter starts.</p>
<p>For example, create a file <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">~/.pythonrc</span></tt> containing:</p>
<div class="highlight-python"><div class="highlight"><pre><span class="k">try</span><span class="p">:</span>
<span class="kn">import</span> <span class="nn">readline</span>
<span class="k">except</span> <span class="ne">ImportError</span><span class="p">:</span>
<span class="c"># Silently ignore missing readline module</span>
<span class="k">pass</span>
<span class="k">else</span><span class="p">:</span>
<span class="kn">import</span> <span class="nn">rlcompleter</span>
<span class="n">readline</span><span class="o">.</span><span class="n">parse_and_bind</span><span class="p">(</span><span class="s">"tab: complete"</span><span class="p">)</span>
</pre></div>
</div>
<p>Then set <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">PYTHONSTARTUP</span></tt> to <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">"~/.pythonrc"</span></tt>. When you start the
interactive interpreter, tab completion for names from the contents of
modules or attributes of objects is activated.</p>
<div class="admonition-see-also admonition seealso">
<p class="first admonition-title">See also</p>
<dl class="last docutils">
<dt><a class="reference external" href="http://docs.python.org/library/rlcompleter.html">rlcompleter</a></dt>
<dd>The standard library documentation for this module.</dd>
<dt><a class="reference internal" href="../readline/index.html#module-readline" title="readline: Interface to the GNU readline library"><tt class="xref py py-mod docutils literal"><span class="pre">readline</span></tt></a></dt>
<dd>The readline module.</dd>
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