In this tutorial, we are going to learn about Python PIP installation and how to use pip in python. In our previous tutorial, we learned about Python Daemon Thread.
Python pip
Python PIP is a package manger, you can use it to install certain libraries to your python installation. You can say it is a replacement for easy_install. We can use pip to install python modules and their dependency also.
In more simple way if we can elaborate PIP in one statement then, Pip is a package management system used to install and manage software packages written in Python. You can download PIP installation file from this link.
Question: Python 2.x Vs Python 3.x :Do I have already PIP?
PIP is there if you are on Python 2 >=2.7.9 or Python 3 >=3.4 binaries downloaded from python.org, but you’ll need to upgrade pip. Also, pip will be there if you are working in a Virtual Environment created by virtualenv or pyvenv.
Python Install pip
There are many ways to install pip, but my preferred method is the following:
Download the get-pip.py in your system or copy content of the above url in a text file and rename it to get-pip.py.
Open a CMD window and select the folder location where the file is located. Run python get-pip.py
For verification of a successful installation, open a CMD window and navigate to scripts folder under Python folder (Default is C:Python27Scripts). Type command from this location to launch the Python interpreter.
pip freeze
It will show the version number of all modules installed in your Python non-standard library; on a fresh install, if there is any error it will be pop up.
Microsoft Windows [Version 6.2.9200]
(c) 2012 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
C:UsersUsername>cd c:Python27Scripts
c:Python27Scripts>pip freeze
antiorm==1.1.1
enum34==1.0
requests==2.3.0
virtualenv==1.11.6
Set environment variable for PIP
If you set PATH environment variable then you won’t have to reference the pip install directory again and again.
Set: (default = C:Python27Scripts) in your Windows/Linux “PATH” environment variable.
PIP Installation for other OS
If you’re running Linux, it’s usually already installed. For other OS follow below steps.
- Ubuntu:
$ sudo apt-get install python-pip - Fedora:
$ sudo yum install python-pip - Mac, you need easy_install:
$sudo easy_install pip
How to use Pip and PYPI
PYPI stands for Python Package Index. It’s required for finding a package to install. Packages will be installed from the Python Package Index. PYPI is a repository of software for the Python programming language.
Getting Started with PIP
To install a package using PIP, just open up your terminal, and type in a search query using the PIP tool.
PIP Commands
Enter pip in your terminal, it will show the following output on screen.
Usage:
pip [options]
Commands:
install Install packages.
uninstall Uninstall packages.
freeze Output installed packages in requirements format.
list List installed packages.
show Show information about installed packages.
search Search PyPI for packages.
zip Zip individual packages.
unzip Unzip individual packages.
bundle Create pybundles.
help Show help for commands.
Commonly used command for pip is install, upgrade or uninstall.
PIP Search packages and modules
For searching any package, i.e. Flask command will be like below.
pip search Flask
Following output will be shown with all packages and description.
Installing a package
If we want to install a required package, let’s say in our case it’s Flask. Now to install it :
pip install Flask
Pip – Show information
For checking information about our newly installed packages.
pip show Flask
---
Name: Flask
Version: 0.10.1
Location: /usr/local/lib/python2.7/dist-packages
Requires: Werkzeug, Jinja2, itsdangerous
Uninstalling a package
For uninstalling any package installed by PIP, you can do as below.
pip uninstall Flask
Uninstalling Flask:
...
.....
Proceed (y/n)?
Successfully uninstalled Flask
That’s all about python pip installation and it’s usage. To know more, see their official documentation.