Proper Unix (.profile, .bash_profile) changes for Python usage

Question

I new to Python and to programming in general. I'm a novice, and do not work in programming, just trying to teach myself how to program as a hobby. Prior to Python, I worked with Ruby for a bit and I learned that one of the biggest challenges was actually properly setting up my computer.

Background: I'm on a Macbook with OSX 10.7.

With Ruby, you have to (or rather, you should), edit your ./profile and add PATH info. When you install and use RVM, there are additional items you need to add to your bash_profile.

Do you have to make similar changes with Python? What are the best practices as I'm installing/getting started to ensure I can install modules and packages correctly?

Answer 1

python works out of the box on OS X (as does ruby, for that matter). The only changes I would recommend for a beginner are:

1) Python likes to be reassured that the terminal can handle UTF-8 before it will print Unicode strings. Add export LANG=en_US.UTF-8 to .profile. (It may be that the .UTF-8 part is already present by default on Lion - I haven't checked since Snow Leopard.) Of course, this is something that will help you in debugging, but you shouldn't rely on it being set this way on other machines.

2) Install pip by doing easy_install pip (add sudo if necessary). After that, install Python packages using pip install; this way, you can easily remove them using pip uninstall.

Answer 2

Take a loot at Python on the Macintosh page first. Like it says, Python comes pre-installed on Mac OS X. It means that you don't have to do anything special in order to use it.

To get started, you can run a Terminal.app, type python and that will get you Python interactive shell up and running.

However, Python on OS X might be of a slightly older version. For example, OS X 10.7.3 comes with Python 2.7.1, whereas latest release version of the Python is 3.2.3. If you want to use other versions, then you will have to install them. Then it all depends on what, where and how you install. If you want to have multiple versions alongside, you may need to set some environment variables like PATH to have binaries you installed found by the bash etc. You can do it through bash ~/.profile if needed.

But until you get to that point - don't worry about it use a version shipped with OS X. Once you want a newer one - download and install it. Then, if it doesn't work out of the box or you have any other problems or concerns, feel free to ask a more specific question.