Python .pth Files Aren't Working

Question

Directories listed in my .pth configuration file aren't appearing in sys.path.

The contents of configuration file, named some_code_dirs.pth:

/home/project

Paths to the file:

/usr/lib/python2.6/site-packages/some_code_dirs.pth
/usr/lib/python2.6/some_code_dirs.pth

Check on sys variables in the python interpreter:

>>> print sys.prefix 
'/usr'
>>> print sys.exec_prefix
'/usr'

All this seems as required in the Python documentation, but sys.path doesn't include the /home/project directory.

Note that the interpreter does add the directory after:

>>> site.addsitedir('/usr/lib/python2.6/site-packages') 

What am I missing here?

Answer 1

What OS are you using? On my Ubuntu 9.04 system that directory is not in sys.path. Try putting it into /usr/lib/python2.6/dist-packages. Notice that it is dist instead of site.

Answer 2

I had a similar problem a while ago. Check the encoding of your pth-file. It seems that pth-files are silently ignored if encoded in UTF-8 with BOM.