VS Code Python autopep8 does not honor 2 spaces hanging indentation

Question

I'm trying to get autopep8 work to properly indent Python code with 2 spaces instead of 4. I'm using VS Code with Python extension which uses autopep8 for formatting. I found here that autopep8 can be configured to use 2 spaces by

"python.formatting.autopep8Args": ["--indent-size=2"]

But it does not work for me.

My situation is like this. When I press enter, it correctly starts the next line with the same indentation as the previous line. Press enter after an open parenthesis, it correctly starts the new line with 2 more spaces. But when I paste or save (I have "editor.formatOnPaste" and "editor.formatOnSave" set to true), the annoying thing happened: all the 2-space indentation inside the parentheses became 4 (other 2-space indentation are unaffected). Why is it doing this and how can I make it 2 spaces everywhere?

====EDIT====

I found out that the pylint error Wrong hanging indentation (remove 2 spaces). [bad-continuation]. It's because my pylintrc has indent-after-paren=2. I'm wondering if autopep8 or other Python formatter can set this property?

Horticulture

I'm curious why you want to have 2 spaces of (hanging) indentation; the standard is 4 spaces. – Clemmy

It's just preference. The question is whether there is a way to customize this. – Horticulture

I realise what your question is. But I'm inclined to say: go with the standard/rest of the world. It makes things, including potentially sharing your code with others, much easier. – Clemmy

According to github.com/google/vim-codefmt/issues/24, it seems autopep8 didn't make progress on it. So either pick black, yapf as your formatter. I prefer use the 2 spaces as indentation. Simply because some companies, like Google has this style to save some space. – Auricle

hey guys. I fighting with this error since I started coding python with vscode. It is VERY ANNOYING to me. putting "python.formatting.autopep8Args": ["--indent-size=2"] inside settings.json WORKED for me. THANK YOU. – Fondea

canbax thanks a lot man, Can you reply to this ask to vote up? – Cloven

Answer 1

Adding --indent-size=2 --ignore=E121 worked for me.

Latour

Answer 2

I also had to include this in my array in settings.json, similar to yours.

"--ignore E121"

According to https://pypi.org/project/autopep8/, this setting ensures your indents are a multiple of 4. By not enforcing that, the configured tab size in VSCode is used.

E121 - Fix indentation to be a multiple of four.

That being said, your indentation is still "acceptable" according to pep8, so it actually will not change it to the 4 spaces you are expecting in your parens. I had to outdent mine one level, then when it ran again, it didn't change it.

Unfortunately this is actually just a workaround and it actually negatively affects other indention rules...

You can see in the code for pep8 that they hardcode the default tab size to be the "python way" (4 spaces) in:

https://github.com/hhatto/autopep8/blob/120537a051d7f3cbbb5c4ede19b9e515156bd3d1/autopep8.py#L104

That makes it look like the hanging indent is just not respecting the --indent-size option...

Stier

Thank you, now I'm able to write extra space before equal sign. – Squarrose

now autopep8 treats --ignore E121 as a file path – Minus

Answer 3

Using "autopep8.args" instead "python.formatting.autopep8Args" worked for me.

"autopep8.args": [
  "--indent-size=2"
]

Pasqualepasqueflower

Answer 4

had the same issue, here is the solution:

1. Navigate to library directory of your environment
2. Open autopep8.py
3. Search for "DEFAULT_INDENT_SIZE" and change it to 2

Marcellusmarcelo

It's probably dirty and breakable, but worked while the previous didn't for me. Thanks! – Cloying

It worked after I restarted vscode. – Discontented