Partly because I don’t often code in Python, I have been feeling some pain using the Python AppEngine SDK. I thought that I would pass on a few things that have made the process easier for me:

• Use an IDE. I have been using PyCharm but other people have mentioned liking Eclipse with the Python and AppEngine plugins. Live hints when I get a local variable name wrong, suggestions to automatically import one of my own modules, and autocompletion have really helped. If I were more familiar with Python and the Python AppEngine SDK then this would not be as beneficial.
• Unit tests: I have been using gaeunit.py to support unit testing and that has been helpful. I get all of the model code and controller helper functions working and tested before doing the UI
• I find that the default Python SDK template engine (from Django) to be adequate and to be fairly easy to use.
• I have found Mark C. Chu-Carroll’s book Code in the Cloud, Programming Google AppEngine to be a useful tutorial.