Related
I'm to deploy Python into a production system and the python script I have has a number of modules associated with it.
Is there a way to install python with only a specific list of modules? Abit like with generating a jar, you can have a folder with all the other dependency jar's in a folder, which is nice and clean. I don't want to compile the python code so I want something similar.
(Note: I also don't want to create a virtual environment - I want the default environment like this)
You can either use virtualenv, which basically is what the name suggests, or you can use Docker, which personally I prefer
If you don't want to do like what Amir is suggesting above, then 2 other options are available:
Copy those modules and place them in the same folder where your script is installed
Create a requirements.txt file with the name & version of those modules and then run "pip install -r requirements.txt" to install these modules in your site-packages folder
To manage your python packages you can use great virtualenv tool, it looks really simple and works well on linux/macOS/Windows. Any package which will be installed in activated virtualenv will be available only in this virtualenv, so you can have for example 3 different versions of "Django" package on your machine and work with them using different virtual environments:
Install virtualenv:
$ pip3 install virtualenv
Create your virtualenv:
$ virtualenv -p python3 my_virtualenv_name
Activate your virtualenv:
$ . my_virtualenv_name/bin/activate
Check what packages have been installed:
$ pip freeze
Install any package for example "Django":
$ pip install Django
Confirm installation:
$ pip freeze | grep Django
Uninstall any package from your virtual environment:
$ pip uninstall Django -y
Uninstall all packages from your virtual environment:
$ pip freeze | xargs pip uninstall -y
Deactivate virtualenv
$ deactivate
More info in the official documentation: https://virtualenv.pypa.io/en/latest/
I've created a virtual environment with:
$ virtualenv my_ven_test
then let's activate the environment with:
$ source my_ven_test/bin/activate
now let's install a package:
(my_ven_test) $ pip install mysql-connector==2.1.3
This last line does not take effect. In fact if I check:
(my_ven_test) $ pip freeze
I see no package installed (as well as the my_ven_test/lib/python/site-package directory doesn't contain the mysql-connector package)
Could you guide me in solving this issue?
Some notes:
python version: 2.7
virtualenv version: 15.1.0
Forget about virtualenv, use the brand new Pipenv which is recommended by Python.org
Pipenv automatically creates and manages a virtualenv for your projects, as well as adds/removes packages from your Pipfile (more about this below) as you install/uninstall packages.
First install pipenv using:
$ pip install pipenv
Then, for installing project specific packages, first create your project folder and then install all necessary packages for your project like:
$ mkdir myproject
$ cd myproject
# install `requests` library
$ pipenv install requests
# install more libraries required for your project
$ pipenv install mysql-connector
$ pipenv install numpy
This will create two files, namely Pipfile and Pipfile.lock. You can find the list of all installed packages for the current project in the file Pipfile while Pipfile.lock has info on hashes like sha256 for all the installed packages and their dependencies.
Once you're done with the installation of all necessary packages for your project, then do:
$ pipenv shell
which will launch a subshell in virtual environment. (This does the similar job of source /your/virtualenv/activate)
Then you can start coding.. For example, you can first test whether installed packages are working fine by launching a Python shell and import the packages like below:
$ python
>>> import requests
# ....
To exit out of the (virtualenv) shell, simply do:
$ exit
Now, you're out of the virtual environment created by pipenv
Read more about it installing packages for your project # pipenv.kennethreitz.org
When you are within a venv you should use the following to install a package:
py -m pip install mysql-connector==2.1.3
the -m ensures the package is installed into your venv and not into your root python
Try installing the package without activating virtualenv:
# Install it
my_ven_test/bin/pip install mysql-connector==2.1.3
# Use grep to check if exists
my_ven_test/bin/pip list | grep mysql-connector
If that works, then try to activate virtualenv by running this code:
. my_ven_test/bin/activate
Try installing another package
pip install flake8
Afterwards, search for those two packages
pip list | grep mysql-connector
pip list | grep flake8
Let me know the result.
I've been looking around for a package manager that can be used with python. I want to list project dependencies in a file.
For example ruby uses Gemfile where you can use bundle install.
How can I achieve this in Python?
The pip tool is becoming the standard in equivalent of Ruby's gems.
Like distribute, pip uses the PyPI package repository (by default) for resolving and downloading dependencies.
pip can install dependencies from a file listing project dependencies (called requirements.txt by convention):
pip install -r requirements.txt
You can "freeze" the current packages on the Python path using pip as well:
pip freeze > requirements.txt
When used in combination with the virtualenv package, you can reliably create project Python environments with a project's required dependencies.
Pipenv
(I know it's an old question, and it already has an answer but for anyone coming here looking for a different answer like me.)
I've found a very good equivalent for npm, It's called pipenv. It handles both virtualenv and pip requirements at the same time so it's more like npm.
Simple Use Case
pip install pipenv
then you can make a new virtualenv with third version of python, as well as making a pipfile that will be filled with your projects requirement and other stuff:
pipenv install --three
using your created virtualenv:
pipenv shell
installing a new python package:
pipenv install requests
running your .py file is like:
pipenv run python somefile.py
you can find it's doc here.
Python uses pip for a package manager. The pip install command has a -r <file> option to install packages from the specified requirements file.
Install command:
pip install -r requirements.txt
Example requirements.txt contents:
Foo >= 1.2
PickyThing <1.6,>1.9,!=1.9.6,<2.0a0,==2.4c1
SomethingWhoseVersionIDontCareAbout
See the Requirements Parsing section of the docs for a full description of the format: https://pip.pypa.io/en/stable/user_guide/#requirements-files
This is how I restrict pip's scope to the current project. It feels like the opposite if you're coming from NodeJS's npm or PHP's composer where you explicitly specify global installations with -g or --global.
If you don't already have virtualenv installed, then install it globally with:
pip install virtualenv
Each Python project should have its own virtualenv installation. It's easy to set one up, just cd to your project's root and:
python3 -m virtualenv env # creates env folder with everything you need
Activate virtualenv:
source env/bin/activate
Now, any interaction with pip is contained within your project.
Run pip install package_name==version for each of your dependencies. They are installed in ./env/lib/python3.x/site-packages/
When you want to save your project's dependencies to a file, run:
pip freeze > requirements.txt
You actually don't need -l or --local if you're in an activated project-specific virtualenv (which you should be).
Now, when you want to install your dependencies from requirements.txt, set up your virtualenv, and run:
pip install -r requirements.txt
That's all.
This is an old question but things are constantly evolving.
Further to the other answer about pipenv. There is also a python package manger called poetry.
There is a detailed comparison between pipenv and poerty here: Feature comparison between npm, pip, pipenv and poetry package managers. It also links the features to common npm features.
Here is a comparison of pipenv vs poetry vs pdm: https://dev.to/frostming/a-review-pipenv-vs-poetry-vs-pdm-39b4
The conclusion is that pdm is the winner.
But in my experience, poetry is easier than pdm to integrate with IDEs.
Short Question
What is the proper way to install pip, virtualenv, and distribute?
Background
In my answer to SO question 4314376, I recommended using ez_setup so that you could then install pip and virtualenv as follows:
curl -O http://peak.telecommunity.com/dist/ez_setup.py
sudo python ez_setup.py
sudo easy_install pip
sudo pip install virtualenv
I originally pulled these instructions from Jesse Noller's blog post So you want to use Python on the Mac?. I like the idea of keeping a clean global site-packages directory, so the only other packages I install there are virtualenvwrapper and distribute. (I recently added distribute to my toolbox because of this Python public service announcement. To install these two packages, I used:
sudo pip install virtualenvwrapper
curl -O http://python-distribute.org/distribute_setup.py
sudo python distribute_setup.py
No more setuptools and easy_install
To really follow that Python public service announcement, on a fresh Python install, I would do the following:
curl -O http://python-distribute.org/distribute_setup.py
sudo python distribute_setup.py
sudo easy_install pip
sudo pip install virtualenv
sudo pip install virtualenvwrapper
Glyph's Rebuke
In a comment to my answer to SO question 4314376, SO user Glyph stated:
NO. NEVER EVER do sudo python setup.py install whatever. Write a ~/.pydistutils.cfg that puts your pip installation into ~/.local or something. Especially files named ez_setup.py tend to suck down newer versions of things like setuptools and easy_install, which can potentially break other things on your operating system.
Back to the short question
So Glyph's response leads me to my original question:
What is the proper way to install pip, virtualenv, and distribute?
You can do this without installing anything into python itself.
You don't need sudo or any privileges.
You don't need to edit any files.
Install virtualenv into a bootstrap virtual environment. Use the that virtual environment to create more. Since virtualenv ships with pip and distribute, you get everything from one install.
Download virtualenv:
http://pypi.python.org/pypi/virtualenv
https://pypi.python.org/packages/source/v/virtualenv/virtualenv-12.0.7.tar.gz
(or whatever is the latest version!)
Unpack the source tarball
Use the unpacked tarball to create a clean virtual environment. This virtual environment will be used to "bootstrap" others. All of your virtual environments will automatically contain pip and distribute.
Using pip, install virtualenv into that bootstrap environment.
Use that bootstrap environment to create more!
Here is an example in bash:
# Select current version of virtualenv:
VERSION=12.0.7
# Name your first "bootstrap" environment:
INITIAL_ENV=bootstrap
# Set to whatever python interpreter you want for your first environment:
PYTHON=$(which python)
URL_BASE=https://pypi.python.org/packages/source/v/virtualenv
# --- Real work starts here ---
curl -O $URL_BASE/virtualenv-$VERSION.tar.gz
tar xzf virtualenv-$VERSION.tar.gz
# Create the first "bootstrap" environment.
$PYTHON virtualenv-$VERSION/virtualenv.py $INITIAL_ENV
# Don't need this anymore.
rm -rf virtualenv-$VERSION
# Install virtualenv into the environment.
$INITIAL_ENV/bin/pip install virtualenv-$VERSION.tar.gz
Now you can use your "bootstrap" environment to create more:
# Create a second environment from the first:
$INITIAL_ENV/bin/virtualenv py-env1
# Create more:
$INITIAL_ENV/bin/virtualenv py-env2
Go nuts!
Note
This assumes you are not using a really old version of virtualenv.
Old versions required the flags --no-site-packges (and depending on the version of Python, --distribute). Now you can create your bootstrap environment with just python virtualenv.py path-to-bootstrap or python3 virtualenv.py path-to-bootstrap.
I think Glyph means do something like this:
Create a directory ~/.local, if it doesn't already exist.
In your ~/.bashrc, ensure that ~/.local/bin is on PATH and that ~/.local is on PYTHONPATH.
Create a file ~/.pydistutils.cfg which contains
[install]
prefix=~/.local
It's a standard ConfigParser-format file.
Download distribute_setup.py and run python distribute_setup.py (no sudo). If it complains about a non-existing site-packages directory, create it manually:
mkdir -p ~/.local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/
Run which easy_install to verify that it's coming from ~/.local/bin
Run pip install virtualenv
Run pip install virtualenvwrapper
Create a virtual env containing folder, say ~/.virtualenvs
In ~/.bashrc add
export WORKON_HOME
source ~/.local/bin/virtualenvwrapper.sh
That's it, no use of sudo at all and your Python environment is in ~/.local, completely separate from the OS's Python. Disclaimer: Not sure how compatible virtualenvwrapper is in this scenario - I couldn't test it on my system :-)
If you follow the steps advised in several tutorials I linked in this answer, you
can get the desired effect without the somewhat complicated "manual" steps in Walker's and Vinay's answers. If you're on Ubuntu:
sudo apt-get install python-pip python-dev
The equivalent is achieved in OS X by using homebrew to install python (more details here).
brew install python
With pip installed, you can use it to get the remaining packages (you can omit sudo in OS X, as you're using your local python installation).
sudo pip install virtualenvwrapper
(these are the only packages you need installed globally and I doubt that it will clash with anything system-level from the OS. If you want to be super-safe, you can keep the distro's versions sudo apt-get install virtualenvwrapper)
Note: in Ubuntu 14.04 I receive some errors with pip install, so I use pip3 install virtualenv virtualenvwrapper and add VIRTUALENVWRAPPER_PYTHON=/usr/bin/python3 to my .bashrc/.zshrc file.
You then append to your .bashrc file
export WORKON_HOME
source /usr/local/bin/virtualenvwrapper.sh
and source it
. ~/.bashrc
This is basically it. Now the only decision is whether you want to create a virtualenv to include system-level packages
mkvirtualenv --system-site-packages foo
where your existing system packages don't have to be reinstalled, they are symlinked to the system interpreter's versions. Note: you can still install new packages and upgrade existing included-from-system packages without sudo - I tested it and it works without any disruptions of the system interpreter.
kermit#hocus-pocus:~$ sudo apt-get install python-pandas
kermit#hocus-pocus:~$ mkvirtualenv --system-site-packages s
(s)kermit#hocus-pocus:~$ pip install --upgrade pandas
(s)kermit#hocus-pocus:~$ python -c "import pandas; print(pandas.__version__)"
0.10.1
(s)kermit#hocus-pocus:~$ deactivate
kermit#hocus-pocus:~$ python -c "import pandas; print(pandas.__version__)"
0.8.0
The alternative, if you want a completely separated environment, is
mkvirtualenv --no-site-packages bar
or given that this is the default option, simply
mkvirtualenv bar
The result is that you have a new virtualenv where you can freely and sudolessly install your favourite packages
pip install flask
Python 3.4 onward
Python 3.3 adds the venv module, and Python 3.4 adds the ensurepip module. This makes bootstrapping pip as easy as:
python -m ensurepip
Perhaps preceded by a call to venv to do so inside a virtual environment.
Guaranteed pip is described in PEP 453.
On Ubuntu:
sudo apt-get install python-virtualenv
The package python-pip is a dependency, so it will be installed as well.
I made this procedure for us to use at work.
cd ~
curl -s https://pypi.python.org/packages/source/p/pip/pip-1.3.1.tar.gz | tar xvz
cd pip-1.3.1
python setup.py install --user
cd ~
rm -rf pip-1.3.1
$HOME/.local/bin/pip install --user --upgrade pip distribute virtualenvwrapper
# Might want these three in your .bashrc
export PATH=$PATH:$HOME/.local/bin
export VIRTUALENVWRAPPER_VIRTUALENV_ARGS="--distribute"
source $HOME/.local/bin/virtualenvwrapper.sh
mkvirtualenv mypy
workon mypy
pip install --upgrade distribute
pip install pudb # Or whatever other nice package you might want.
Key points for the security minded:
curl does ssl validation. wget doesn't.
Starting from pip 1.3.1, pip also does ssl validation.
Fewer users can upload the pypi tarball than a github tarball.
Update: As of July 2013 this project is no longer maintained. The author suggests using pyenv. (pyenv does not have built-in support for virtualenv, but plays nice with it.)
Pythonbrew is a version manager for python and comes with support for virtualenv.
After installing pythonbrew and a python-version using venvs is really easy:
# Initializes the virtualenv
pythonbrew venv init
# Create a virtual/sandboxed environment
pythonbrew venv create mycoolbundle
# Use it
pythonbrew venv use mycoolbundle
I've had various problems (see below) installing upgraded SSL modules, even inside a virtualenv, on top of older OS-provided Python versions, so I now use pyenv.
pyenv makes it very easy to install new Python versions and supports virtualenvs. Getting started is much easier than the recipes for virtualenv listed in other answers:
On Mac, type brew install pyenv and on Linux, use pyenv-installer
this gets you built-in virtualenv support as well as Python version switching (if required)
works well with Python 2 or 3, can have many versions installed at once
This works very well to insulate the "new Python" version and virtualenv from system Python. Because you can easily use a more recent Python (post 2.7.9), the SSL modules are already upgraded, and of course like any modern virtualenv setup you are insulated from the system Python modules.
A couple of nice tutorials:
Using pyenv and virtualenv - when selecting a Python version, it's easier to use pyenv global 3.9.1 (global to current user) or pyenv local 3.6.3 (local to current directory).
pyenv basics and use with virtualenv
The pyenv-virtualenv plugin is now built in - type pyenv commands | grep virtualenv to check. I wouldn't use the pyenv-virtualenvwrapper plugin to start with - see how you get on with pyenv-virtualenv which is more integrated into pyenv, as this covers most of what virtualenvwrapper does.
pyenv is modelled on rbenv (a good tool for Ruby version switching) and its only dependency is bash.
pyenv is unrelated to the very similarly named pyvenv - that is a virtualenv equivalent that's part of recent Python 3 versions, and doesn't handle Python version switching
Caveats
Two warnings about pyenv:
It only works from a bash or similar shell - or more specifically, the pyenv-virtualenv plugin doesn't like dash, which is /bin/sh on Ubuntu or Debian.
It must be run from an interactive login shell (e.g. bash --login using a terminal), which is not always easy to achieve with automation tools such as Ansible.
Hence pyenv is best for interactive use, and less good for scripting servers.
Older distributions - SSL module problems
One reason to use pyenv was that there were often problems with upgrading Python SSL modules when using older system-provided Python versions. This may be less of a problem now that current Linux distributions support Python 3.x.
There is no problem to do sudo python setup.py install, if you're sure it's what you want to do.
The difference is that it will use the site-packages directory of your OS as a destination for .py files to be copied.
so, if you want pip to be accessible os wide, that's probably the way to go. I do not say that others way are bad, but this is probably fair enough.
Install ActivePython. It includes pip, virtualenv and Distribute.
I came across the same problem recently. I’m becoming more partial to the “always use a virtualenv” mindset, so my problem was to install virtualenv with pip without installing distribute to my global or user site-packages directory. To do this, I manually downloaded distribute, pip and virtualenv, and for each one I ran “python setup.py install --prefix ~/.local/python-private” (with a temporary setting of PYTHONPATH=~/.local/python-private) so that setup scripts were able to find distribute). I’ve moved the virtualenv script to another directory I have on my PATH and edited it so that the distribute and virtualenv modules can be found on sys.path. Tada: I did not install anything to /usr, /usr/local or my user site-packages dir, but I can run virtualenv anywhere, and in that virtualenv I get pip.
The good news is if you have installed python3.4, pyvenv is already been installed. So, Just
pyvenv project_dir
source project_dir/bin/activate
python --version
python 3.4.*
Now in this virtual env, you can use pip to install modules for this project.
Leave this virtual env , just
deactivate
You can do this without installing anything into python itself.
You don't need sudo or any privileges.
You don't need to find the latest version of a virtualenv tar file
You don't need to edit version info in a bash script to keep things up-to-date.
You don't need curl/wget or tar installed, nor pip or easy_install
this works for 2.7 as well as for 3.X
Save the following to /tmp/initvenv.py:
from __future__ import print_function
import os, sys, shutil, tempfile, subprocess, tarfile, hashlib
try:
from urllib2 import urlopen
except ImportError:
from urllib.request import urlopen
tmp_dir = tempfile.mkdtemp(prefix='initvenv_')
try:
# read the latest version from PyPI
f = urlopen("https://pypi.python.org/pypi/virtualenv/")
# retrieve the .tar.gz file
tar_found = False
url = None
sha256 = None
for line in f.read().splitlines():
if isinstance(line, bytes):
line = line.decode('utf-8')
if tar_found:
if 'sha256' in line:
sha256 = line.split('data-clipboard-text')[1].split('"')[1]
break
continue
if not tar_found and 'tar.gz">' not in line:
continue
tar_found = True
for url in line.split('"'):
if url.startswith('https'):
break
else:
print('tar.gz not found')
sys.exit(1)
file_name = url.rsplit('/', 1)[1]
print(file_name)
os.chdir(tmp_dir)
data = urlopen(url).read()
data_sha256 = hashlib.sha256(data).hexdigest()
if sha256 != data_sha256:
print('sha256 not correct')
print(sha256)
print(data_sha256)
sys.exit(1)
with open(file_name, 'wb') as fp:
fp.write(data)
tar = tarfile.open(file_name)
tar.extractall()
tar.close()
os.chdir(file_name.replace('.tar.gz', ''))
print(subprocess.check_output([sys.executable, 'virtualenv.py'] +
[sys.argv[1]]).decode('utf-8'), end='')
if len(sys.argv) > 2:
print(subprocess.check_output([
os.path.join(sys.argv[1], 'bin', 'pip'), 'install', 'virtualenv'] +
sys.argv[2:]).decode('utf-8'), end='')
except:
raise
finally:
shutil.rmtree(tmp_dir) # always clean up
and use it as
python_binary_to_use_in_venv /tmp/initvenv.py your_venv_name [optional packages]
e.g. (if you really need the distribute compatibility layer for setuptools)
python /tmp/initvenv.py venv distribute
Please note that, with older python versions, this might give you InsecurePlatformWarnings¹.
Once you have your virtualenv (name e.g. venv) you can setup another virtualenv by using the virtualenv just installed:
venv/bin/virtualenv venv2
###virtualenvwrapper
I recommend taking a look at virtualenvwrapper as well, after a one time setup:
% /opt/python/2.7.10/bin/python /tmp/initvenv.py venv virtualenvwrapper
and activation (can be done from your login script):
% source venv/bin/virtualenvwrapper.sh
you can do things like:
% mktmpenv
New python executable in tmp-17bdc3054a46b2b/bin/python
Installing setuptools, pip, wheel...done.
This is a temporary environment. It will be deleted when you run 'deactivate'.
(tmp-17bdc3054a46b2b)%
¹ I have not found a way to suppress the warning. It could be solved in pip and/or request, but the developers point to each other as the cause. I got the, often non-realistic, recommendation to upgrade the python version I was using to the latest version. I am sure this would break e.g my Linux Mint 17 install. Fortunately pip caches packages, so the Warning is made
only once per package install.
There are good instructions on the Virtualenv official site. https://pypi.python.org/pypi/virtualenv
Basically what I did, is install pip with sudo easy_install pip, then used sudo pip install virtualenv then created an environment with: virtualenv my_env (name it what you want), following that I did: virtualenv --distribute my_env; which installed distribute and pip in my virtualenv.
Again, follow the instruction on the virtualenv page.
Kind of a hassle, coming from Ruby ;P
Here is a nice way to install virtualenvwrapper(update of this).
Download virtualenv-1.11.4 (you can find latest at here), Unzip it, open terminal
# Create a bootstrapenv and activate it:
$ cd ~
$ python <path to unzipped folder>/virtualenv.py bootstrapenv
$ source bootstrapenv/bin/activate
# Install virtualenvwrapper:
$ pip install virtualenvwrapper
$ mkdir -p ~/bootstrapenv/Envs
# append it to file `.bashrc`
$ vi ~/.bashrc
source ~/bootstrapenv/bin/activate
export WORKON_HOME=~/bootstrapenv/Envs
source ~/bootstrapenv/bin/virtualenvwrapper.sh
# run it now.
$ source ~/.bashrc
That is it, now you can use mkvirtualenv env1, lsvirtualenv ..etc
Note: you can delete virtualenv-1.11.4 and virtualenv-1.11.4.zip from Downloads folders.
Short Question
What is the proper way to install pip, virtualenv, and distribute?
Background
In my answer to SO question 4314376, I recommended using ez_setup so that you could then install pip and virtualenv as follows:
curl -O http://peak.telecommunity.com/dist/ez_setup.py
sudo python ez_setup.py
sudo easy_install pip
sudo pip install virtualenv
I originally pulled these instructions from Jesse Noller's blog post So you want to use Python on the Mac?. I like the idea of keeping a clean global site-packages directory, so the only other packages I install there are virtualenvwrapper and distribute. (I recently added distribute to my toolbox because of this Python public service announcement. To install these two packages, I used:
sudo pip install virtualenvwrapper
curl -O http://python-distribute.org/distribute_setup.py
sudo python distribute_setup.py
No more setuptools and easy_install
To really follow that Python public service announcement, on a fresh Python install, I would do the following:
curl -O http://python-distribute.org/distribute_setup.py
sudo python distribute_setup.py
sudo easy_install pip
sudo pip install virtualenv
sudo pip install virtualenvwrapper
Glyph's Rebuke
In a comment to my answer to SO question 4314376, SO user Glyph stated:
NO. NEVER EVER do sudo python setup.py install whatever. Write a ~/.pydistutils.cfg that puts your pip installation into ~/.local or something. Especially files named ez_setup.py tend to suck down newer versions of things like setuptools and easy_install, which can potentially break other things on your operating system.
Back to the short question
So Glyph's response leads me to my original question:
What is the proper way to install pip, virtualenv, and distribute?
You can do this without installing anything into python itself.
You don't need sudo or any privileges.
You don't need to edit any files.
Install virtualenv into a bootstrap virtual environment. Use the that virtual environment to create more. Since virtualenv ships with pip and distribute, you get everything from one install.
Download virtualenv:
http://pypi.python.org/pypi/virtualenv
https://pypi.python.org/packages/source/v/virtualenv/virtualenv-12.0.7.tar.gz
(or whatever is the latest version!)
Unpack the source tarball
Use the unpacked tarball to create a clean virtual environment. This virtual environment will be used to "bootstrap" others. All of your virtual environments will automatically contain pip and distribute.
Using pip, install virtualenv into that bootstrap environment.
Use that bootstrap environment to create more!
Here is an example in bash:
# Select current version of virtualenv:
VERSION=12.0.7
# Name your first "bootstrap" environment:
INITIAL_ENV=bootstrap
# Set to whatever python interpreter you want for your first environment:
PYTHON=$(which python)
URL_BASE=https://pypi.python.org/packages/source/v/virtualenv
# --- Real work starts here ---
curl -O $URL_BASE/virtualenv-$VERSION.tar.gz
tar xzf virtualenv-$VERSION.tar.gz
# Create the first "bootstrap" environment.
$PYTHON virtualenv-$VERSION/virtualenv.py $INITIAL_ENV
# Don't need this anymore.
rm -rf virtualenv-$VERSION
# Install virtualenv into the environment.
$INITIAL_ENV/bin/pip install virtualenv-$VERSION.tar.gz
Now you can use your "bootstrap" environment to create more:
# Create a second environment from the first:
$INITIAL_ENV/bin/virtualenv py-env1
# Create more:
$INITIAL_ENV/bin/virtualenv py-env2
Go nuts!
Note
This assumes you are not using a really old version of virtualenv.
Old versions required the flags --no-site-packges (and depending on the version of Python, --distribute). Now you can create your bootstrap environment with just python virtualenv.py path-to-bootstrap or python3 virtualenv.py path-to-bootstrap.
I think Glyph means do something like this:
Create a directory ~/.local, if it doesn't already exist.
In your ~/.bashrc, ensure that ~/.local/bin is on PATH and that ~/.local is on PYTHONPATH.
Create a file ~/.pydistutils.cfg which contains
[install]
prefix=~/.local
It's a standard ConfigParser-format file.
Download distribute_setup.py and run python distribute_setup.py (no sudo). If it complains about a non-existing site-packages directory, create it manually:
mkdir -p ~/.local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/
Run which easy_install to verify that it's coming from ~/.local/bin
Run pip install virtualenv
Run pip install virtualenvwrapper
Create a virtual env containing folder, say ~/.virtualenvs
In ~/.bashrc add
export WORKON_HOME
source ~/.local/bin/virtualenvwrapper.sh
That's it, no use of sudo at all and your Python environment is in ~/.local, completely separate from the OS's Python. Disclaimer: Not sure how compatible virtualenvwrapper is in this scenario - I couldn't test it on my system :-)
If you follow the steps advised in several tutorials I linked in this answer, you
can get the desired effect without the somewhat complicated "manual" steps in Walker's and Vinay's answers. If you're on Ubuntu:
sudo apt-get install python-pip python-dev
The equivalent is achieved in OS X by using homebrew to install python (more details here).
brew install python
With pip installed, you can use it to get the remaining packages (you can omit sudo in OS X, as you're using your local python installation).
sudo pip install virtualenvwrapper
(these are the only packages you need installed globally and I doubt that it will clash with anything system-level from the OS. If you want to be super-safe, you can keep the distro's versions sudo apt-get install virtualenvwrapper)
Note: in Ubuntu 14.04 I receive some errors with pip install, so I use pip3 install virtualenv virtualenvwrapper and add VIRTUALENVWRAPPER_PYTHON=/usr/bin/python3 to my .bashrc/.zshrc file.
You then append to your .bashrc file
export WORKON_HOME
source /usr/local/bin/virtualenvwrapper.sh
and source it
. ~/.bashrc
This is basically it. Now the only decision is whether you want to create a virtualenv to include system-level packages
mkvirtualenv --system-site-packages foo
where your existing system packages don't have to be reinstalled, they are symlinked to the system interpreter's versions. Note: you can still install new packages and upgrade existing included-from-system packages without sudo - I tested it and it works without any disruptions of the system interpreter.
kermit#hocus-pocus:~$ sudo apt-get install python-pandas
kermit#hocus-pocus:~$ mkvirtualenv --system-site-packages s
(s)kermit#hocus-pocus:~$ pip install --upgrade pandas
(s)kermit#hocus-pocus:~$ python -c "import pandas; print(pandas.__version__)"
0.10.1
(s)kermit#hocus-pocus:~$ deactivate
kermit#hocus-pocus:~$ python -c "import pandas; print(pandas.__version__)"
0.8.0
The alternative, if you want a completely separated environment, is
mkvirtualenv --no-site-packages bar
or given that this is the default option, simply
mkvirtualenv bar
The result is that you have a new virtualenv where you can freely and sudolessly install your favourite packages
pip install flask
Python 3.4 onward
Python 3.3 adds the venv module, and Python 3.4 adds the ensurepip module. This makes bootstrapping pip as easy as:
python -m ensurepip
Perhaps preceded by a call to venv to do so inside a virtual environment.
Guaranteed pip is described in PEP 453.
On Ubuntu:
sudo apt-get install python-virtualenv
The package python-pip is a dependency, so it will be installed as well.
I made this procedure for us to use at work.
cd ~
curl -s https://pypi.python.org/packages/source/p/pip/pip-1.3.1.tar.gz | tar xvz
cd pip-1.3.1
python setup.py install --user
cd ~
rm -rf pip-1.3.1
$HOME/.local/bin/pip install --user --upgrade pip distribute virtualenvwrapper
# Might want these three in your .bashrc
export PATH=$PATH:$HOME/.local/bin
export VIRTUALENVWRAPPER_VIRTUALENV_ARGS="--distribute"
source $HOME/.local/bin/virtualenvwrapper.sh
mkvirtualenv mypy
workon mypy
pip install --upgrade distribute
pip install pudb # Or whatever other nice package you might want.
Key points for the security minded:
curl does ssl validation. wget doesn't.
Starting from pip 1.3.1, pip also does ssl validation.
Fewer users can upload the pypi tarball than a github tarball.
Update: As of July 2013 this project is no longer maintained. The author suggests using pyenv. (pyenv does not have built-in support for virtualenv, but plays nice with it.)
Pythonbrew is a version manager for python and comes with support for virtualenv.
After installing pythonbrew and a python-version using venvs is really easy:
# Initializes the virtualenv
pythonbrew venv init
# Create a virtual/sandboxed environment
pythonbrew venv create mycoolbundle
# Use it
pythonbrew venv use mycoolbundle
I've had various problems (see below) installing upgraded SSL modules, even inside a virtualenv, on top of older OS-provided Python versions, so I now use pyenv.
pyenv makes it very easy to install new Python versions and supports virtualenvs. Getting started is much easier than the recipes for virtualenv listed in other answers:
On Mac, type brew install pyenv and on Linux, use pyenv-installer
this gets you built-in virtualenv support as well as Python version switching (if required)
works well with Python 2 or 3, can have many versions installed at once
This works very well to insulate the "new Python" version and virtualenv from system Python. Because you can easily use a more recent Python (post 2.7.9), the SSL modules are already upgraded, and of course like any modern virtualenv setup you are insulated from the system Python modules.
A couple of nice tutorials:
Using pyenv and virtualenv - when selecting a Python version, it's easier to use pyenv global 3.9.1 (global to current user) or pyenv local 3.6.3 (local to current directory).
pyenv basics and use with virtualenv
The pyenv-virtualenv plugin is now built in - type pyenv commands | grep virtualenv to check. I wouldn't use the pyenv-virtualenvwrapper plugin to start with - see how you get on with pyenv-virtualenv which is more integrated into pyenv, as this covers most of what virtualenvwrapper does.
pyenv is modelled on rbenv (a good tool for Ruby version switching) and its only dependency is bash.
pyenv is unrelated to the very similarly named pyvenv - that is a virtualenv equivalent that's part of recent Python 3 versions, and doesn't handle Python version switching
Caveats
Two warnings about pyenv:
It only works from a bash or similar shell - or more specifically, the pyenv-virtualenv plugin doesn't like dash, which is /bin/sh on Ubuntu or Debian.
It must be run from an interactive login shell (e.g. bash --login using a terminal), which is not always easy to achieve with automation tools such as Ansible.
Hence pyenv is best for interactive use, and less good for scripting servers.
Older distributions - SSL module problems
One reason to use pyenv was that there were often problems with upgrading Python SSL modules when using older system-provided Python versions. This may be less of a problem now that current Linux distributions support Python 3.x.
There is no problem to do sudo python setup.py install, if you're sure it's what you want to do.
The difference is that it will use the site-packages directory of your OS as a destination for .py files to be copied.
so, if you want pip to be accessible os wide, that's probably the way to go. I do not say that others way are bad, but this is probably fair enough.
Install ActivePython. It includes pip, virtualenv and Distribute.
I came across the same problem recently. I’m becoming more partial to the “always use a virtualenv” mindset, so my problem was to install virtualenv with pip without installing distribute to my global or user site-packages directory. To do this, I manually downloaded distribute, pip and virtualenv, and for each one I ran “python setup.py install --prefix ~/.local/python-private” (with a temporary setting of PYTHONPATH=~/.local/python-private) so that setup scripts were able to find distribute). I’ve moved the virtualenv script to another directory I have on my PATH and edited it so that the distribute and virtualenv modules can be found on sys.path. Tada: I did not install anything to /usr, /usr/local or my user site-packages dir, but I can run virtualenv anywhere, and in that virtualenv I get pip.
The good news is if you have installed python3.4, pyvenv is already been installed. So, Just
pyvenv project_dir
source project_dir/bin/activate
python --version
python 3.4.*
Now in this virtual env, you can use pip to install modules for this project.
Leave this virtual env , just
deactivate
You can do this without installing anything into python itself.
You don't need sudo or any privileges.
You don't need to find the latest version of a virtualenv tar file
You don't need to edit version info in a bash script to keep things up-to-date.
You don't need curl/wget or tar installed, nor pip or easy_install
this works for 2.7 as well as for 3.X
Save the following to /tmp/initvenv.py:
from __future__ import print_function
import os, sys, shutil, tempfile, subprocess, tarfile, hashlib
try:
from urllib2 import urlopen
except ImportError:
from urllib.request import urlopen
tmp_dir = tempfile.mkdtemp(prefix='initvenv_')
try:
# read the latest version from PyPI
f = urlopen("https://pypi.python.org/pypi/virtualenv/")
# retrieve the .tar.gz file
tar_found = False
url = None
sha256 = None
for line in f.read().splitlines():
if isinstance(line, bytes):
line = line.decode('utf-8')
if tar_found:
if 'sha256' in line:
sha256 = line.split('data-clipboard-text')[1].split('"')[1]
break
continue
if not tar_found and 'tar.gz">' not in line:
continue
tar_found = True
for url in line.split('"'):
if url.startswith('https'):
break
else:
print('tar.gz not found')
sys.exit(1)
file_name = url.rsplit('/', 1)[1]
print(file_name)
os.chdir(tmp_dir)
data = urlopen(url).read()
data_sha256 = hashlib.sha256(data).hexdigest()
if sha256 != data_sha256:
print('sha256 not correct')
print(sha256)
print(data_sha256)
sys.exit(1)
with open(file_name, 'wb') as fp:
fp.write(data)
tar = tarfile.open(file_name)
tar.extractall()
tar.close()
os.chdir(file_name.replace('.tar.gz', ''))
print(subprocess.check_output([sys.executable, 'virtualenv.py'] +
[sys.argv[1]]).decode('utf-8'), end='')
if len(sys.argv) > 2:
print(subprocess.check_output([
os.path.join(sys.argv[1], 'bin', 'pip'), 'install', 'virtualenv'] +
sys.argv[2:]).decode('utf-8'), end='')
except:
raise
finally:
shutil.rmtree(tmp_dir) # always clean up
and use it as
python_binary_to_use_in_venv /tmp/initvenv.py your_venv_name [optional packages]
e.g. (if you really need the distribute compatibility layer for setuptools)
python /tmp/initvenv.py venv distribute
Please note that, with older python versions, this might give you InsecurePlatformWarnings¹.
Once you have your virtualenv (name e.g. venv) you can setup another virtualenv by using the virtualenv just installed:
venv/bin/virtualenv venv2
###virtualenvwrapper
I recommend taking a look at virtualenvwrapper as well, after a one time setup:
% /opt/python/2.7.10/bin/python /tmp/initvenv.py venv virtualenvwrapper
and activation (can be done from your login script):
% source venv/bin/virtualenvwrapper.sh
you can do things like:
% mktmpenv
New python executable in tmp-17bdc3054a46b2b/bin/python
Installing setuptools, pip, wheel...done.
This is a temporary environment. It will be deleted when you run 'deactivate'.
(tmp-17bdc3054a46b2b)%
¹ I have not found a way to suppress the warning. It could be solved in pip and/or request, but the developers point to each other as the cause. I got the, often non-realistic, recommendation to upgrade the python version I was using to the latest version. I am sure this would break e.g my Linux Mint 17 install. Fortunately pip caches packages, so the Warning is made
only once per package install.
There are good instructions on the Virtualenv official site. https://pypi.python.org/pypi/virtualenv
Basically what I did, is install pip with sudo easy_install pip, then used sudo pip install virtualenv then created an environment with: virtualenv my_env (name it what you want), following that I did: virtualenv --distribute my_env; which installed distribute and pip in my virtualenv.
Again, follow the instruction on the virtualenv page.
Kind of a hassle, coming from Ruby ;P
Here is a nice way to install virtualenvwrapper(update of this).
Download virtualenv-1.11.4 (you can find latest at here), Unzip it, open terminal
# Create a bootstrapenv and activate it:
$ cd ~
$ python <path to unzipped folder>/virtualenv.py bootstrapenv
$ source bootstrapenv/bin/activate
# Install virtualenvwrapper:
$ pip install virtualenvwrapper
$ mkdir -p ~/bootstrapenv/Envs
# append it to file `.bashrc`
$ vi ~/.bashrc
source ~/bootstrapenv/bin/activate
export WORKON_HOME=~/bootstrapenv/Envs
source ~/bootstrapenv/bin/virtualenvwrapper.sh
# run it now.
$ source ~/.bashrc
That is it, now you can use mkvirtualenv env1, lsvirtualenv ..etc
Note: you can delete virtualenv-1.11.4 and virtualenv-1.11.4.zip from Downloads folders.