How to load IPython shell with PySpark

Question

If you use Spark < 1.2 you can simply execute bin/pyspark with an environmental variable IPYTHON=1.

IPYTHON=1 /path/to/bin/pyspark

or

export IPYTHON=1
/path/to/bin/pyspark

While above will still work on the Spark 1.2 and above recommended way to set Python environment for these versions is PYSPARK_DRIVER_PYTHON

PYSPARK_DRIVER_PYTHON=ipython /path/to/bin/pyspark

or

export PYSPARK_DRIVER_PYTHON=ipython
/path/to/bin/pyspark

You can replace ipython with a path to the interpreter of your choice.