Initialization

When a Mathematica project is launched, a connection is made to a Mathematica kernel. This initializes Mathematica so that you can run, test, and improve the code in your project.

Setting the Path

The setting of the Mathematica path is particularly important, as this affects operations that load source files. By default, the root of the project is on the path; this can however be modified. A later section describes the setting of the path.

Execution Build Command

The execution build command is run after the path has been set. It can be used to initialize and load source code. It is particularly useful for working with Mathematica applications that are spread over several source files. The execution build command is set by the project properties.

If the execution build command has not been set, then all source files in the project will be loaded. This is described in the next section.

If the launch is done on a Mathematica notebook, then you can also evaluate initialization cells when you start your launch. This is described in the section on notebook properties. You should note that initialization cells are only evaluated when the project is launched. They are not reevaluated, for example, if a source file is modified and saved.

Reinitialization

If a source file is modified and saved after a project has been launched, Mathematica is reinitialized. This follows a similar procedure to that described above. That is, if the initial evaluation has been set, this is executed; otherwise, the source files will be loaded.

Preventing Initialization

If you do not want to evaluate anything at startup and do not wish to load any files, you can set an initial evaluation of None.