How can I program software using Python for Linux/Windows?

For example, using C# I can make software fairly easily for Windows.

I downloaded Python but all I get is a terminal like window for executing single lines of code.

Is there a free IDE/Visual editor for designing GUI's in conjunction with Python?

Th开发者_开发问答ank SO. :D

The character-based terminal (console) interface isn't the only one Python affords. It is often the most visible because it is

• "built-in"
• often used in the early stages of learning the language, allowing one to focus on various idioms of the language, without the added complexity of the object model and API associated with a GUI
• quite handy for many quick jobs, script-like / awk-like type applications, whether ad-hoc or more permanent.

GUIs for Python are aplenty, in fact overwhelmingly so, which can be handicap as people try and decide which one to use. Often, the choice may be driven by one's familiarity with these GUI frameworks, for as you can see they are not specific to Python (recognize their names, often with a Py prefix). Another criteria may be their support (or lack thereof) on various Operating Systems. And yet another criteria may be the way these framework tie-in with broader systems such as MVC frameworks etc..
Anyway the arguably most popular one may be:

• TkInter (tk/tcl)
• PyQT
• WxPython
• and if you want more...
• here's a "complete" list

Similarly, there are several IDEs for developing in Python, although many of these do not include GUI designer features. Here's a representative but certainly incomplete list. They are listed in no particular order (do comment on possible significant omissions or errors with regard to features). Most are either free or inexpensive.

• IDLE
• Eric
• PyDev
• Wing IDE
• Netbeans IDE
• the following have some GUI design features (underlying GUI in parenthesis)
• BlackAdder (Qt)
• Boa Constructor (Wx)
• Komodo (Tk) (I think commerical, now)
• Eclipse

The capabilities of these IDEs vary greatly, and some may cover some areas of development rather well (ex debugging, or unittesting) while being weak in other areas (say auto-completion). Many Python developers also manage rather well with "plain" (but well featured) text editors and a few macros/plug-ins.

Yes, lots.

http://wiki.python.org/moin/GuiProgramming

If you know .Net and C#, you could use IronPython and WPF. Then you can use Visual Studio 2010 Beta 2 as your development environment. Here's an example of how it can be done.