Syntax Highlighter using Pygments and Python

I was using this web site to highlight and format my SQL code to HTML to insert into our wiki at work on Sharepoint, when all of a sudden the website stopped working. After some searching I discovered the site was using Pygments, a Syntax Highlighting Library for Python. So I decided to try and roll my own solution. This article will detail the steps I went through to make it happen.

Download

• Download Python 2.7, 3.3 did not work for Easy Setup which I used to install pygments. http://www.python.org/download/


• Download Easy Setup also called setuptools. https://pypi.python.org/pypi/setuptools

Install

• Installed Python 2.7 with the defaults which creates a folder called C:Python27


• Installed Easy Setup using the EXE taking the defaults


• Installed Pygments by hitting a console window and running this from the C:Python27Scripts folder. easy_install Pygments

Configure

• You have to configure IIS to work with Python.


• IIS 7: I used this article for IIS 7 config: http://forums.iis.net/t/1122937.aspx


• IIS 6: I used this article for IIS 6 Config: http://www.winservermart.com/HowTo/Install-Python-In-Windows-Server.aspx


• The IIS 6 and IIS 7 config is a little different specifically on the Executable parameters.

Code

• First I setup a basic HTML page with a simple form.The page had a single form with a TEXTAREA named code.


• Second I pieced a codedump.py Python file together using code snippets from the Pygments web site, StackOvervlow, and Python help files.

#!/usr/bin/env python
# -*- coding: UTF-8 -*-

import cgi
# enable debugging
import cgitb
cgitb.enable()

#print "Content-Type: text/plain;charset=utf-8"
print


from pygments import highlight
from pygments.lexers import SqlLexer
from pygments.formatters import HtmlFormatter
from pygments.styles import get_all_styles


form = cgi.FieldStorage()
code = form["code"].value

print ""
print ""
print ""
print highlight(code, SqlLexer(), HtmlFormatter(noclasses=True,style='default')) 
print ""
print ""
print ""
#print HtmlFormatter().get_style_defs('.highlight')


print highlight(code,SqlLexer(),HtmlFormatter(noclasses=True,style='default'))


#print list(get_all_styles())

• SqlLexer is hardcoded here meaning that we can only convert SQL code with this page.


• Working on allowing for other languages


• Pygments Formatter has several options, this code is only using the noclasses and style options.


• There are several builtin Styles and you can create your own styles.

Here is the semi-finished product. http://www.thejoestory.com/codeschemer

Next Steps

• Allow for different types of code


• Create a custom style (don’t like the default background color)