Google has released the Google App Engine Launcher for Windows, a graphical user interface for creating, running and deploying App Engine applications when developing on Windows.
In a recent blog post, John Grabowski, a software engineer at Google, said Google App Engine 1.2.5 SDK for Python now includes the Google App Engine Launcher for Windows. Overall, the goal of the launcher is to help make App Engine development quick and easy, he said.
“About a year ago, a few of us recognized a need for a client tool to help with App Engine development,” Grabowski said. He said a group of Google engineers had created a Mac version of the launcher in their “20 percent time”-the time that Google allows its engineers to work on independent projects. “Of course, not all App Engine developers have Macs, so more work was needed,” Grabowski said, noting that a new group of engineers set out to create the Windows launcher.
Added Grabowski:
““The Windows launcher is written in Python and uses wxPython for its GUI. This means (with a little care) the launcher should work on Linux, and we’d like Linux developers to have the option of using it. Although we ship a binary of the Launcher for Windows (thanks to py2exe), shipping binaries for Linux is a bit more challenging. Fortunately, Google has a well-traveled path for solving this problem. For example, Google O3D provides binaries for Windows/Mac; it also provides source code and instructions for building on Linux. Thus inspired, we’ve open sourced the Windows launcher so that developers can use it on other platforms.”“
In addition, Grabowski said Google has begun the process of open sourcing the Mac version of the launcher.