How to work on Python project to be run on an EC2 instance?

Question

I just started a web project using Python/webpy. I've created an Amazon EC2 instance and now would like to work on the actual development side.

Is there a way for me to open the Python files located on the EC2 instance from my local development machine using a development environment such as Komodo? I don't want to be using nano or vi since I need more than a basic text editor. If the approach that I've mentioned is not best practice, could you recommend a better alternative?

Answer 1

You have a lot of options there:

1. Use version control system like SVN, Git or Mercurial (my personal preference is the last one). You set up a repo somewhere like bitbucket or github, then just commit from dev machine and check out from web server.

2. Use FTP/SFTP

3. (my personal favorite) Use SSHFS to mount web server's filesystem to your local. SSH connection will be used to exchange data, but for all purposes, your IDE will treat remote files as if they were local ones!

   You haven't specified your OS, but I'm sure that with little googling you would be able to find the solution.

   • For Linux machines, there is a combo of sshfs and fuse utilities. One of mini-installation guides can be found here: http://www.go2linux.org/sshfs-mount-remote-filesystem-using-ssh
   • For Windows machines, see this question for popular solutions: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/443732/how-do-i-mount-a-remote-linux-folder-in-windows-through-ssh

Answer 2

You could use FTP to push data to the server when you've finished working on it, or use GIT to push/pull data to a remote repo