# Pluto Questions

**URL:** <https://discourse.julialang.org/t/pluto-questions/61259>\
**Category:** New to Julia\
**Created:** [May 16, 2021, 7:02pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/pluto-questions/61259 "2021-05-16T19:02:20Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![onButtonUp](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/onbuttonup/32/3098_2.png) [@onButtonUp](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/onButtonUp)\
**Post date:** [May 16, 2021, 7:02pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/pluto-questions/61259/1 "2021-05-16T19:02:20Z")

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Does Pluto automatically stores files in the cloud on github or something ? . . . just notice it accessing github when I start and load previous files.

Does Pluto assign filenames (seperate from the ones the user save files as) ?  
Notice filenames showing up like: “Fascinating experiment.jl”, “Groundbreaking proof.jl”, “Groundbreaking computation.jl”. Not sure where these name came from . . . : /

Is it possible to use more than one Pluto session at a time ?  
Notice if I open a second instance of Pluto to do side by side comparisons, the first session gets to a point that it indicates " Not yet authenticated . . . Open the link that was printed in the terminal where you launched Pluto."

* * *

Evaluating if I should use Jupyter notebooks or Pluto. It seems that Pluto may have some wizwig stuff that needs to be reckoned with . . .

Hope all is well with Julia users !

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**Author:** ![lungben](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/lungben/32/12314_2.png) [@lungben](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/lungben)\
**Post date:** [May 16, 2021, 7:42pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/pluto-questions/61259/2 "2021-05-16T19:42:24Z")

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Hi,

> [@onButtonUp](#):
>
> Does Pluto automatically stores files in the cloud on github or something ?

No. Notebook files are stored as default in `.julia/pluto_notebooks`, but any storage location can be used.  
The Github access may be due to installation of Julia packages (both the General registry and the vast majority of Julia packages are on Github).

> [@onButtonUp](#):
>
> Does Pluto assign filenames (seperate from the ones the user save files as) ?

Pluto notebooks have the extension `.jl`. If a new notebook is created, it gets a default filename because the notebook is saved on any cell execution, but you can change it when manually saving the notebook.

> [@onButtonUp](#):
>
> Is it possible to use more than one Pluto session at a time ?

Yes. Ctrl+click on the Pluto symbol in one notebook opens a new tab with the Pluto startup screen, where you can open a 2nd notebook (or create a new one).  
Each notebook is run in a separate Julia process.

In principle it should also be possible to run 2 Pluto servers in parallel, but then you need to take care to use the correct secrets for each instance.

> [@onButtonUp](#):
>
> Evaluating if I should use Jupyter notebooks or Pluto.

Use Pluto (OK, I might be a bit biased 😉 )

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**Author:** ![onButtonUp](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/onbuttonup/32/3098_2.png) [@onButtonUp](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/onButtonUp)\
**Post date:** [May 18, 2021, 12:48pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/pluto-questions/61259/3 "2021-05-18T12:48:44Z")

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Very helpful.

So many choices . . . there is also VS Code and the Julia REPL . . .

: )

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**Author:** ![lungben](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/lungben/32/12314_2.png) [@lungben](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/lungben)\
**Post date:** [May 18, 2021, 1:03pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/pluto-questions/61259/4 "2021-05-18T13:03:56Z")

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There is also [https://github.com/JuliaPluto/PlutoTest.jl](https://github.com/JuliaPluto/PlutoTest.jl) for writing tests in Pluto (alpha version).  
This could be combined with either development in VSCode (with Revise) or directly in the Pluto notebook.

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**Author:** ![josePereiro](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/josepereiro/32/17322_2.png) [@josePereiro](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/josePereiro)\
**Post date:** [May 18, 2021, 1:27pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/pluto-questions/61259/5 "2021-05-18T13:27:25Z")

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On VS Code you can have a notebook like (jupyter like) experience using just the Julia extension. In any `.jl` file you can divide chunks of codes by using a comment separator starting with `##` and running it with a `Shift+enter`. The julia extension will open a `RELP` and execute the selected (by cursor position) code section.

Example

```julia
# A first section that load stuff
using Example

## -------------------------------- (Note the leading ##)
# A section that just declare a variable
name = "John"

## --------------------------------
# Do stuff
hello(name)

```

The output is printed in the relp each time you execute a section.

The running section is persistent and does not care about the particular file you are in. You can run pieces of code from different files. And it has, unlike jupyter, a good interaction with version control from the get-go.