Spyder: Spyder doesn't start in Python 3.8

[manfred2020]

during the last days i discovered that spyder doesn't work in my python 3.8 environment.
i set up a new python 3.8.2 env. in anaconda und then just installed spyder - spyder does start until a white screen, then hangs...

spyder works fine in py 3.7 envs at my system, but no spyder version works in py 3.8 envs (doesn't matter if i set up a new env. or upgrade from a working 3.7 env to 3.8).

this issue was already discussed at stackoverflow.com:
https://stackoverflow.com/questions/58557238/spyder-ide-fails-to-start-on-windows-10-with-python-3-8
that workaround didn't work for me.

is this issue know?

[ccordoba12]

during the last days i discovered that spyder doesn't work in my python 3.8 environment.

Right, it doesn't work but it's not our fault but from our dependencies. If you want it working please use Anaconda or keep using 3.7 until all issues are fixed in the different packages we depend on.

[manfred2020]

ok.
what does that mean "If you want it working please use Anaconda"? i'm using Anaconda.

[ccordoba12]

Sorry I though you were using pip. Supposedly Anaconda patched the problematic packages and Spyder should be working on Python 3.8 on Windows, but I haven't tested that, sorry.

[manfred2020]

i also thought it worked... (i already had py 3.8 env. with spyder for 4 month or so).

but within the last days (with that spyder 4.1.0 problem - you know there were some threads here) i set up some new py 3.8 env. and spyder never again worked. the only thing i get is a white screen after spyder starts (like described at the stackoverflow thread). i also did a complete new installation of anaconda (newest version from their website).

[ericpre]

I can reproduce the issue using miniconda and the anaconda defaults channel:

Step to reproduce:

conda create -n spyder spyder
conda activate spyder
spyder

and spyder hang with a white screen.

conda list

# packages in environment at C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\envs\spyder:
#
# Name                    Version                   Build  Channel
alabaster                 0.7.12                     py_0  
argh                      0.26.2                   py38_0  
asn1crypto                1.3.0                    py38_0  
astroid                   2.3.3                    py38_0  
atomicwrites              1.3.0                      py_0  
attrs                     19.3.0                     py_0  
autopep8                  1.4.4                      py_0  
babel                     2.8.0                      py_0  
backcall                  0.1.0                    py38_0  
bcrypt                    3.1.7            py38he774522_0  
bleach                    3.1.0                      py_0  
ca-certificates           2020.1.1                      0  
certifi                   2019.11.28               py38_1  
cffi                      1.14.0           py38h7a1dbc1_0  
chardet                   3.0.4                 py38_1003  
cloudpickle               1.3.0                      py_0  
colorama                  0.4.3                      py_0  
cryptography              2.8              py38h7a1dbc1_0  
decorator                 4.4.2                      py_0  
defusedxml                0.6.0                      py_0  
diff-match-patch          20181111                   py_0  
docutils                  0.16                     py38_0  
entrypoints               0.3                      py38_0  
flake8                    3.7.9                    py38_0  
future                    0.18.2                   py38_0  
icu                       58.2                 ha66f8fd_1  
idna                      2.9                        py_1  
imagesize                 1.2.0                      py_0  
importlib_metadata        1.5.0                    py38_0  
intervaltree              3.0.2                      py_0  
ipykernel                 5.1.4            py38h39e3cac_0  
ipython                   7.13.0           py38h5ca1d4c_0  
ipython_genutils          0.2.0                    py38_0  
isort                     4.3.21                   py38_0  
jedi                      0.15.2                   py38_0  
jinja2                    2.11.1                     py_0  
jpeg                      9b                   hb83a4c4_2  
jsonschema                3.2.0                    py38_0  
jupyter_client            6.1.0                      py_0  
jupyter_core              4.6.1                    py38_0  
keyring                   21.1.0                   py38_0  
lazy-object-proxy         1.4.3            py38he774522_0  
libpng                    1.6.37               h2a8f88b_0  
libsodium                 1.0.16               h9d3ae62_0  
libspatialindex           1.9.3                h33f27b4_0  
markupsafe                1.1.1            py38he774522_0  
mccabe                    0.6.1                    py38_1  
mistune                   0.8.4           py38he774522_1000  
nbconvert                 5.6.1                    py38_0  
nbformat                  5.0.4                      py_0  
numpydoc                  0.9.2                      py_0  
openssl                   1.1.1e               he774522_0  
packaging                 20.3                       py_0  
pandoc                    2.2.3.2                       0  
pandocfilters             1.4.2                    py38_1  
paramiko                  2.7.1                      py_0  
parso                     0.5.2                      py_0  
pathtools                 0.1.2                      py_1  
pexpect                   4.8.0                    py38_0  
pickleshare               0.7.5                 py38_1000  
pip                       20.0.2                   py38_1  
pluggy                    0.13.1                   py38_0  
prompt-toolkit            3.0.4                      py_0  
prompt_toolkit            3.0.4                         0  
psutil                    5.7.0            py38he774522_0  
pycodestyle               2.5.0                    py38_0  
pycparser                 2.20                       py_0  
pydocstyle                4.0.1                      py_0  
pyflakes                  2.1.1                    py38_0  
pygments                  2.6.1                      py_0  
pylint                    2.4.4                    py38_0  
pynacl                    1.3.0            py38h62dcd97_0  
pyopenssl                 19.1.0                   py38_0  
pyparsing                 2.4.6                      py_0  
pyqt                      5.9.2            py38ha925a31_4  
pyrsistent                0.15.7           py38he774522_0  
pysocks                   1.7.1                    py38_0  
python                    3.8.2                h5fd99cc_0  
python-dateutil           2.8.1                      py_0  
python-jsonrpc-server     0.3.4                      py_0  
python-language-server    0.31.9                   py38_0  
pytz                      2019.3                     py_0  
pywin32                   227              py38he774522_1  
pywin32-ctypes            0.2.0                 py38_1000  
pyyaml                    5.3.1            py38he774522_0  
pyzmq                     18.1.1           py38ha925a31_0  
qdarkstyle                2.8                        py_0  
qt                        5.9.7            vc14h73c81de_0  
qtawesome                 0.7.0                      py_0  
qtconsole                 4.7.2                      py_0  
qtpy                      1.9.0                      py_0  
requests                  2.23.0                   py38_0  
rope                      0.16.0                     py_0  
rtree                     0.9.3            py38h21ff451_0  
setuptools                46.1.1                   py38_0  
sip                       4.19.13          py38ha925a31_0  
six                       1.14.0                   py38_0  
snowballstemmer           2.0.0                      py_0  
sortedcontainers          2.1.0                    py38_0  
sphinx                    2.4.4                      py_0  
sphinxcontrib-applehelp   1.0.2                      py_0  
sphinxcontrib-devhelp     1.0.2                      py_0  
sphinxcontrib-htmlhelp    1.0.3                      py_0  
sphinxcontrib-jsmath      1.0.1                      py_0  
sphinxcontrib-qthelp      1.0.3                      py_0  
sphinxcontrib-serializinghtml 1.1.4                      py_0  
spyder                    4.1.1                    py38_1  
spyder-kernels            1.9.0                    py38_0  
sqlite                    3.31.1               he774522_0  
testpath                  0.4.4                      py_0  
tornado                   6.0.4            py38he774522_1  
traitlets                 4.3.3                    py38_0  
ujson                     1.35             py38he774522_0  
urllib3                   1.25.8                   py38_0  
vc                        14.1                 h0510ff6_4  
vs2015_runtime            14.16.27012          hf0eaf9b_1  
watchdog                  0.10.2                   py38_0  
wcwidth                   0.1.8                      py_0  
webencodings              0.5.1                    py38_1  
wheel                     0.34.2                   py38_0  
win_inet_pton             1.1.0                    py38_0  
wincertstore              0.2                      py38_0  
wrapt                     1.12.1           py38he774522_1  
yaml                      0.1.7                hc54c509_2  
yapf                      0.28.0                     py_0  
zeromq                    4.3.1                h33f27b4_3  
zipp                      2.2.0                      py_0  
zlib                      1.2.11               h62dcd97_3  

[manfred2020]

thanks, i thought this problem is not so common, since i didn't found much about it in the internet...

unfortunately this thread is already closed.

sooner or later a lot of people will switch to python 3.8 and will use spyder, so the problem has to be solved i hope :-)

[vtanna]

I have been waiting for a fix for a few weeks now.

I use miniconda., and I did 'conda installed spyder'. Spyder hangs due to asyncio error reported on OP's linked stackoverflow page

If anaconda patched the problematic packages, the patch hasn't been pushed out.

[ccordoba12]

Please report this error here:

https://github.com/ContinuumIO/anaconda-issues/issues/

We can't do anything about it.

[mingwandroid]

Hi @ccordoba12. I spent a few minutes looking into this just now. I think this problem is nothing to do with the conda ecosystem (indeed, the initial reports from SO are based around non-conda Python versions).

I tested the change proposed in https://stackoverflow.com/a/58682830 for Tornado and it fixes this issue. For now it's back in your hands as to how this should be handled as I don't know enough about it to be honest!

Here are some references that may prove useful for that:

The actual issue: https://github.com/tornadoweb/tornado/issues/2608
The change to Python: https://bugs.python.org/issue37373

As it stands, no-one using any Python 3.8 on Windows can run Spyder, so it cannot be a conda ecosystem issue.

Cheers!

[mingwandroid]

Oh I must say, when looking at this, that kite thing looks pretty fancy (I tried it on Linux), but I am somewhat concerned about it installing files in, for example, systemd system directories. My distro (or me, explicitly) is the only thing that should ever do that IMHO.

[mingwandroid]

.. reason being, it will cause the system package manager difficulty if it tries to also install kite.

[ccordoba12]

As it stands, no-one using any Python 3.8 on Windows can run Spyder, so it cannot be a conda ecosystem issue.

Ok, thanks a lot Ray for taking the time to take a look at this! I thought you were already applying that patch and something else was failing.

I think we need to apply that patch in qtconsole because we don't use asyncio directly here. But we'll take a look at it in the next couple of weeks.

Oh I must say, when looking at this, that kite thing looks pretty fancy (I tried it on Linux)

Glad you like it!! We worked very hard with the Kite team to implement that for Spyder 4.

but I am somewhat concerned about it installing files in, for example, systemd system directories. My distro (or me, explicitly) is the only thing that should ever do that IMHO.

That's probably done to autostart Kite at the beginning. @metalogical, could you give us some details about why Kite needs to register as a service with systemd?

[its-dhung]

Hi @mingwandroid, Kite uses systemd to auto update itself. We ship releases at least once a week so it's important to keep the Kite application up to date.

That said, you can always remove this service:

systemctl disable --user --now kite-updater.timer

If you want to manually update Kite, you can use the command:

~/.local/share/kite/current/kite-update update

[ccordoba12]

Thanks for input @its-dhung!

We ship releases at least once a week so it's important to keep the Kite application up to date.

Is it not possible to install something for the user instead of system-wide? Or make the app contact Kite servers and then run kite-update update at the user level?

[metalogical]

Is it not possible to install something for the user instead of system-wide? Or make the app contact Kite servers and then run kite-update update at the user level?

This is actually what we do: we install a user systemd service (which is why you can disable it via systemd disable --user).

The Kite app could call home itself, but this is less robust in the scenario that the app crashes or doesn't start at all, which is always a (small) risk that comes with very rapid iteration.

[ccordoba12]

This is actually what we do: we install a user systemd service (which is why you can disable it via systemd disable --user).

Ok, I see. Then it's fine for me.

The Kite app could call home itself, but this is less robust in the scenario that the app crashes or doesn't start at all, which is always a (small) risk that comes with very rapid iteration.

Ok, I understand better your decision to use systemd now. Thanks @metalogical!

[ccordoba12]

@dalthviz, please see if something like this PR https://github.com/jupyter/qtconsole/pull/406/files will help us to fix this problem.

That PR is not the right solution for us because we don't use qtconsoleapp.py here. So the patching that that PR is doing needs to be applied in another place in the qtconsole codebase.

[manfred2020]

great, spyder 4.1.3 now works with python 3.8 on windows. thanks!

[ccordoba12]

Thanks for the confirmation @manfred2020!