Mac OS X comes with Python 2.7 out of the box.
Preparations: XCode CLI. Make a full backup of your system right before following these instructions. Open the App Store to install XCode, Apple’s IDE for developing Swift. How to install Homebrew on macOS Catalina or M1 Mac Open Terminal and enter this command xcode-select -install Click Install from the popup. Go through the T&C and click Agree if you do. Run Xcode and accept the license! Homebrew can not install properly until this occurs. Install Homebrew. If this is not a fresh install of Homebrew, go ahead and purge the complete installation first. The simplest way to install Homebrew is through ruby and curl, accomplished with a single command. This approach is the same for installing Homebrew in all supported versions of Mac OS and Mac OS X. Open the “Terminal” application, found in /Applications/Utilities/ Enter the following command into a single line of the terminal.
You do not need to install or configure anything else to use Python 2. Theseinstructions document the installation of Python 3.
The version of Python that ships with OS X is great for learning, but it’s notgood for development. The version shipped with OS X may be out of date from theofficial current Python release,which is considered the stable production version.
Doing it Right¶
Let’s install a real version of Python.
Before installing Python, you’ll need to install GCC. GCC can be obtainedby downloading Xcode, the smallerCommand Line Tools (must have anApple account) or the even smaller OSX-GCC-Installerpackage.
Note
If you already have Xcode installed, do not install OSX-GCC-Installer.In combination, the software can cause issues that are difficult todiagnose.
Note
If you perform a fresh install of Xcode, you will also need to add thecommandline tools by running xcode-select--install on the terminal.
While OS X comes with a large number of Unix utilities, those familiar withLinux systems will notice one key component missing: a package manager.Homebrew fills this void.
To install Homebrew, open Terminal oryour favorite OS X terminal emulator and run
The script will explain what changes it will make and prompt you before theinstallation begins.Once you’ve installed Homebrew, insert the Homebrew directory at the topof your PATH environment variable. You can do this by adding the followingline at the bottom of your ~/.profile file
If you have OS X 10.12 (Sierra) or older use this line instead
Now, we can install Python 3:
This will take a minute or two.
Pip¶
Homebrew installs pip pointing to the Homebrew’d Python 3 for you.
Working with Python 3¶
At this point, you have the system Python 2.7 available, potentially theHomebrew version of Python 2 installed, and the Homebrewversion of Python 3 as well.
will launch the Homebrew-installed Python 3 interpreter.
will launch the Homebrew-installed Python 2 interpreter (if any).
will launch the Homebrew-installed Python 3 interpreter.
If the Homebrew version of Python 2 is installed then pip2 will point to Python 2.If the Homebrew version of Python 3 is installed then pip will point to Python 3.
The rest of the guide will assume that python references Python 3.
Pipenv & Virtual Environments¶
The next step is to install Pipenv, so you can install dependencies and manage virtual environments.
A Virtual Environment is a tool to keep the dependencies required by different projectsin separate places, by creating virtual Python environments for them. It solves the“Project X depends on version 1.x but, Project Y needs 4.x” dilemma, and keepsyour global site-packages directory clean and manageable.
For example, you can work on a project which requires Django 1.10 while alsomaintaining a project which requires Django 1.8.
So, onward! To the Pipenv & Virtual Environments docs!
This page is a remixed version of another guide,which is available under the same license.
Sometimes you want to install software that is typically categorized as F/OSS(Free, or Open Source Software).
Homebrew is a packaging system for OS X whichmakes installing (and keeping them updated) many of these bits of software easy.
Install Xcode
To start with, we need to install the Xcode tools. Its not necessary toinstall all of Xcode to do this. We can simply run:
Install homebrew
Now that we have Xcode tools installed, we can install homebrew. Start bylooking at the web page: http://brew.sh
When you’re ready, open up Terminal.app and paste in the following (thisassumes you are using a bourne shell derivitive. If not, you will needto modifiy as appropriate):
Homebrew installs a bunch of files into ‘/usr/local’ and its intended to berun as a regular user (with the implication that ‘/usr/local’ needs to beowned and writable by said regular user.
Brew update
The first thing you should know how to do is update the brew repository.
This will reach out to github and pull down the current version of thehomebrew repository, containing all the recipies for packages you may want touse.
Brew install example
Now that you have homebrew installed, you can use it to install software. Forexample, I like to install the ‘mtr’ package instead of using the traditionaltraceroute. The install process looks like this:
The output from running ‘sudo mtr -c 1 google.com’ might look like:
If you don’t want to have to call mtr with sudo, you can do the following:
You will probably have to substitute a newer version for the ‘0.86’. After yourun these commands, you should be able to execute mtr with out using sudo.
Brew search
Now, you can go use brew to install other software. Search the list ofavailable packages with
Homebrew Xcode Catalina
If you don’t specify a name or an expression ‘/expression/’, it will dump allthat is available.
Once you’ve selected the package you wish to install, you can
Brew upgrade (all)
Lastly, you should know how to upgrade packages you’ve installed. Presumingyou’ve already run a ‘brew update’ (discussed above), you should run
Homebrew Install Xcode
This will look through all of the packages you have installed, compare it tothe current list (this information was fetched when you ran ‘brew update’),and then it will upgrade any packages that are out of date.