tl;dr - CodeWhisperer is a decent tool for a beginner/intermediate coder like myself to quickly write generic functions using common packages or APIs, and maybe to learn how to better comment and structure code too

I got preview access and took CodeWhisperer for a spin. Hereā€™s what happened.

Round one

Yesterday I wrote this little function while working on a script that generates HTML reports from field data captured with Esriā€™s Survey123:

# take img path an return an html image tag with base64 data
def j64(src, width='', height=''):
    with open(src, "rb") as image_file:
        encoded_string = base64.b64encode(image_file.read())
    img = '<img src="data:image/jpg;base64, ' + str(encoded_string)[2:-1] + f'" width="{width}" height="{height}" />'
    return img

Some context: I was looking to generate a single html file for each report to simplify archiving. Reports include images and I was looking to embed them. Exporting html to pdf would do this but brings in formatting issues (which is why I switched to html from the original .docx output used in the script I modified) and further dependency requirements (potentially problematic when running on our Jenkins server). base64 allows you to embed image binary data directly with a giant text string.

I deleted my function from the existing code, and then provided this slightly clearer comment as a prompt for CW:

# a function that takes an image path as an argument and returns a base64 version of the image

I called for suggestions (ALT+C) and got:

def encode_image(image_path):
    with open(image_path, 'rb') as img_file:
        return base64.b64encode(img_file.read())

Nailed it. Getting more specific:

# a function that takes an image path as an argument and returns an html image
# containing the base64 version of the image

def img_to_html(img_path):
    """
    Takes an image path as an argument and returns an html image
    containing the base64 version of the image
    """
    with open(img_path, 'rb') as img_file:
        encoded_string = base64.b64encode(img_file.read())
    return '<img src="data:image/jpeg;base64, {}">'.format(encoded_string.decode())

Super. This actually improved on my code by using a method I wasnā€™t aware of - decode() - to get rid of a couple little tags which I had stumbled over yesterday and resolved via string indexing.

And one more ask:

# a function that takes an image path and dimensions as arguments and returns an html image
# containing the base64 version of the image that can be used in a web page

def make_img_tag(img_path, width, height):
    # open the image
    with open(img_path, 'rb') as image_file:
        encoded_string = base64.b64encode(image_file.read())
    # create the html tag
    img_tag = f'<img src="data:image/jpeg;base64,{encoded_string.decode()}" width="{width}" height="{height}"/>'
    return img_tag

Pretty much identical with my code. All of these were the first suggestion CW provided, though you can easily flip through more suggestions with the arrow keys. Flipping through the suggestions shows some interesting differences in commenting and style. This could be due to the variation within my script or the training data. How about f-strings every time, please?

Taking it a step beyond what I had initially written (only jpg in my project):

# a function that takes an image path and dimensions as arguments and returns an html image
# containing the base64 version of the image and correct image type that can be used in a web page

def make_img_tag(img_path, width, height):
    # open the image
    img = Image.open(img_path)
    # set the image dimensions
    img.thumbnail((width, height))
    # convert the image to base64
    img_str = base64.b64encode(img.tobytes())
    # create the html image tag
    img_tag = '<img src="data:image/png;base64, {}">'.format(img_str)
    return img_tag

No dice. At first. But then I added (jpeg or png) to the comment, flipped through a few suggestions, and voila:

# a function that takes an image path and dimensions as arguments and returns an html image
# containing the base64 version of the image and correct image type (jpeg or png) that can be used in a web page

def make_img_tag(img_path, width, height):
    # get the file extension
    ext = os.path.splitext(img_path)[1]
    # make the base64 version of the image
    with open(img_path, 'rb') as image_file:
        encoded_string = base64.b64encode(image_file.read())
    # make the html image tag
    img_tag = '<img src="data:image/{};base64,{}" width="{}" height="{}"/>'.format(ext[1:],
                                                                                  encoded_string.decode('utf-8'),
                                                                                  width,
                                                                                  height)
    return img_tag

I guess I will have to forgive the format() method. Maybe if I had always used f-strings in my script, then the suggestion would have done so as well?

How about some arcpy?

The little bit of reading I did on CW explains that it is trained on a ā€œvariety of data sources including Amazon open source code.ā€ Since geospatial and arcpy are a little more niche, I thought it would be interesting to see how CW performed here.

I started with this comment block in a new file:

'''
Open an ArcGIS Pro project and create a new feature class
'''

Which led CW to give me these lines one at a time:

import arcpy

# Set the workspace

arcpy.env.workspace = r"C:\Users\bwc\Documents\ArcGIS\Projects\TestProject'

# Create a new feature class

arcpy.CreateFeatureclass_management(r"C:\Users\bwc\Documents\ArcGIS\Projects\TestProject'","test_fc", "POINT", "", "", "", "DISABLED", "DISABLED", "")

Not too shabby. Repeating the process it was funny to see the different filler filepaths that were suggested.

Letā€™s try and be more specific, modifying only the last comment:

# Create a new polygon feature class, with fields for 'date' and 'number of cats spotted'

I got:

arcpy.CreateFeatureclass_management("C:/Temp/donnees.gdb", "cats", "POLYGON", "", "", "", "date", "number of cats spotted")

Hmm not so sure those last couple arguments would do what we wanted. Maybe if this was inside a function?

# a function to create a new polygon feature class, with fields for 'date' and 'number of cats spotted'

def create_fc(fc_name, fc_type):
    # create a new feature class
    arcpy.CreateFeatureclass_management(r"C:\Users\bwc\Documents\ArcGIS\Projects\TestProject'","test_fc", fc_type)
    # add fields
    arcpy.AddField_management("test_fc", "date", "TEXT")
    arcpy.AddField_management("test_fc", "number_of_cats_spotted", "SHORT")
    # return the path to the new feature class
    return arcpy.Describe("test_fc").catalogPath

Pretty nice. I like that it didnā€™t include all the optional arguments in CreateFeatureclass(). But why not use DATE as the field type for a field called date?

How about jumping into a larger arcpy script?

I tried adding this to the end of an existing geoprocessing script (~500 lines):

# a function to project a feature class to Web Mercator before publishing

Alas

What if we try in a new file?

Prompt:

import arcpy

# a function to project a feature class to Web Mercator before publishing

Suggestion:

def projectFeatureClass(inFC, outFC):
    # get the coordinate system of the input feature class
    inDesc = arcpy.Describe(inFC)
    inCS = inDesc.spatialReference
    # get the coordinate system of the output feature class
    outCS = arcpy.SpatialReference(3857)
    # project the input feature class to Web Mercator
    arcpy.Project_management(inFC, outFC, outCS)
    # return the projected feature class
    return outFC

Hey that works. My first thought was that there no need to get the input spatial reference.

Flipping through a few suggestions, I found:

def project_fc(fc, out_fc):
    """
    Project a feature class to Web Mercator.

    Parameters
    ----------
    fc : str
        Path to the input feature class.
    out_fc : str
        Path to the output feature class.
    sr : str
        Spatial reference of the output feature class.

    Returns
    -------
    None

    """
    # get the coordinate system of the input feature class
    in_sr = arcpy.Describe(fc).spatialReference
    # if the input coordinate system is already Web Mercator, return
    if in_sr.name == "WGS_1984_Web_Mercator_Auxiliary_Sphere":
        return
    # otherwise, project the feature class to Web Mercator
    arcpy.Project_management(fc, out_fc)
    # set the coordinate system of the output feature class to Web Mercator
    arcpy.DefineProjection_management(out_fc)
    # return
    return

Aha - now I see why there was the inclination to check out in the initial spatial reference (duh!). Learning from AIā€¦ this is interesting.

The very rigorous style used here is a little funny because of the inclusion of blank return statements. But maybe the more advanced logic is part of the package. It seems like small variations in the prompt, even coming down to styling, can lead to more or less functional code suggestions.