<p>I would like to be able to drop to the python REPL from the debugger -- if this is not possible is there an easier way to evaluate python expressions in the context of the  current breakpoint other than manually adding them all as watch expressions?</p>

I don't use
pydev
, but to drop to python's interactive REPL from code:
```
```
import code
code.interact(local=locals())
```
```
To drop to python's debugger from code:
```
```
import pdb
pdb.set_trace()
```
```
Finally, to run a interactive REPL after running some code, you can use python's
```
-i
```
switch:
```
```
python -i script.py
```
```
That will give you a python prompt after the code, even if it throws an exception.
You may be able to hook some of those solutions into
pydev
, I think.