Visual Studio Code Development Environment Review

The goal of this walk-through was to expose you to the integrations with simple examples. This section validates the environment is ready for use.

Python Integration

In this section you will create a simple Python script to retrieve search results from iTunes. You are looking to validate the Python functionality within the Visual Studio Code Editor.

Don't worry, you don't have to know any Python at this point...

1. CREATE a file named search_itunes.py

2. PASTE the Python code below

   import sys
   import requests
   
   # CONSTANTS
   BASE_URL = "https://itunes.apple.com/search?country=US"
   MEDIA = ['movie', 'music', 'podcast']
   
   # INPUT VARIABLES
   media = input("What type of media? [movie, music, or podcast]:  ").lower()
   
   # VALIDATE INPUT
   if media not in MEDIA:
       print(f"Please type one of the valid options [{MEDIA}]")
       sys.exit()
   
   term = input("Enter search string:  ").lower()
   
   # INTERNAL VARIABLES
   _url = f"{BASE_URL}&media={media}&term={term}"
   _session = requests.session()
   
   # MAKE REST API CALL
   results = _session.get(_url)
   
   # EXTRACT RESULT DATA FROM RESONSE OBJECT
   data = results.json()['results']
   
   # LOOP OVER RESULTS AND PRINT
   for result in data:
       print(f"{result['trackName']:<50}{result['releaseDate']:>50}")
   

3. SAVE the file

4. CLICK the green play button

1. ANSWER the prompts

2. REVIEW the results

The presence of the green play button indicates the Python extension is working.

You can also see the Python Debugger on the left, the 4th icon down.