Hi all, This is a topic that I have spent way too many hours on... Ever since Mac OS 10.4 I have been fine-tuning installation instructions for these packages, aiming for the shortest instructions installing as few extras as possible. With Lion it is finally getting very simple :-)
First off, I agree that the Enthought Python distribution is a good way to go. It has the downsides of being a separate Python installation (at least pretty well implemented) and costing quite a bit of money to get the full functionality. So if you want an alternative costing only a little bit of effort, read on... Second, I would not recommend installing another Python on a Mac unless you know what you are doing. Just use the system-provided Python! In my experience the Mac environment is not very well configured to handle multiple Pythons and you can easily find your Python code using some bits of the one Python distribution and some of the other, leading to strange bugs. Ask yourself whether you really need Python 2.7.2 when you already have 2.7.1 installed. [Yes, I know you can "brew install python", but it goes against the whole philosophy of Homebrew, doesn't it?] This installs the latest stable releases of these packages, using only Homebrew and easy_install. I use the system-provided NumPy 1.5.1, as this is good enough for most purposes and therefore one less package to install. I assume that you have Lion, Xcode 4 and not much else (see the more detailed instructions below if you have more than this). For the impatient, here are my instructions ready to be entered on your Terminal: /usr/bin/ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.github.com/gist/323731)" brew update brew install pkg-config gfortran zeromq pyqt echo "export PYTHONPATH=/usr/local/lib/python:\$PYTHONPATH" >> ~/.bash_profile sudo easy_install nose Sphinx readline Pygments pyzmq IPython matplotlib sudo CC=clang CXX=clang++ FFLAGS=-ff2c easy_install scipy I also attach a more detailed description below, including tests to check whether your installation works. Now to put all of this on a blog... :-) Enjoy and good luck, Ludwig Installing NumPy / SciPy / Matplotlib / IPython on Mac OS 10.7 (Lion) ===================================================================== Updated 21/02/2012 Apple Software -------------- - Install Mac OS 10.7 (Lion) from the App Store - Do a Software Update - Install Xcode 4 from the App Store. You need to run the "Install Xcode" app that is downloaded to /Applications. Test Xcode by confirming that "gcc" runs in the Terminal. Homebrew -------- - In preparation for homebrew, the best option is to delete /usr/local via:: sudo rm -rf /usr/local and install any software in it via homebrew instead. If this step fills you with dread and you do not want to lose your beloved third-party software, the second-best option is to make sure you have write permission for the directory via:: sudo chown -R username:staff /usr/local - Install Homebrew (http://mxcl.github.com/homebrew/) by running the following command in the Terminal:: /usr/bin/ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.github.com/gist/323731)" - Run "brew update" to get the latest formulas - Install the first package, just to have an existing homebrew Cellar:: brew install pkg-config - Run "brew doctor" and check the suggestions. Specifically, comment out references to Mac OS 10.6 in ~/.profile, contained in environment variables such as MACOSX_DEPLOYMENT_TARGET, CFLAGS, LDFLAGS and FFLAGS. - Now install the following packages:: brew install gfortran zeromq pyqt - Add the following lines to your ~/.bash_profile (or ~/.profile if it exists):: # This is for SIP (and PyQT) as installed (and suggested) by Homebrew export PYTHONPATH=/usr/local/lib/python:$PYTHONPATH IPython ------- - Install the following Python packages (nose is for running unit tests, Sphinx creates documentation and readline, Pygments and pyzmq enhance IPython):: sudo easy_install nose Sphinx readline Pygments pyzmq IPython NumPy ----- - Lion comes with NumPy 1.5.1 out of the box. This is sufficient for our purposes, and we therefore use the system version. We can verify it by running the test suite from within Python:: import numpy as np np.test('full') The result for NumPy version 1.5.1 is (the failures may be ignored):: FAILED (KNOWNFAIL=4, SKIP=1, failures=8) <nose.result.TextTestResult run=3019 errors=0 failures=8> SciPy ----- - The current stable version of SciPy compiles on Lion, as long as you pass the appropriate compiler flags (you need at least 0.10.0):: sudo CC=clang CXX=clang++ FFLAGS=-ff2c easy_install scipy - Test that the installation worked by running the test suite from within Python (first change to another directory before running Python):: import scipy scipy.test() The result for SciPy version 0.10.0 is (the failures may be ignored):: FAILED (KNOWNFAIL=12, SKIP=36, failures=8) <nose.result.TextTestResult run=5095 errors=0 failures=8> Matplotlib ---------- - If you want support for TeX rendering in matplotlib, install MacTeX first from http://www.tug.org/mactex. - Matplotlib is now easy_installable on Lion (you need at least version 1.1.0):: sudo easy_install matplotlib - Test that the installation worked by running the test suite from within Python (first change to another directory before running Python):: import pylab pylab.test() The result for Matplotlib version 1.1.0 is:: OK (SKIP=1) <nose.result.TextTestResult run=156 errors=0 failures=0> - A more thorough test of Matplotlib involves the following:: brew install libjpeg wget http://effbot.org/downloads/Imaging-1.1.7.tar.gz tar xzvf Imaging-1.1.7.tar.gz cd Imaging-1.1.7 <... edit setup.py so that 'FREETYPE_ROOT = libinclude("/usr/X11R6")' ...> python setup.py build sudo python setup.py install <... start python ...> import matplotlib matplotlib.test() The result for Matplotlib version 1.1.0 is (this takes a while!):: Ran 993 tests in 208.338s OK (KNOWNFAIL=264) This generates a lot of test images in the current directory - feel free to wipe the result_images/ directory afterwards. - Install the matplotlibrc file in your home directory and edit it to select the default backend. If you followed these instructions you should be able to use the MacOSX, TkAgg and Qt4Agg interactive backends:: mkdir ~/.matplotlib cp /Library/Python/2.7/site-packages/matplotlib-1.1.0-py2.7-macosx-10.7-intel.egg/matplotlib/mpl-data/matplotlibrc ~/.matplotlib vi ~/.matplotlib/matplotlibrc - For fun, try out the new IPython Qt console and HTML notebook with inline Matplotlib plots (assuming you have at least IPython version 0.12). This is a good test to verify that all the previous steps worked. In the Qt console, type `plot([1,2])` to see an inline plot appear (this also highlights the function help docstring that pops up as you type). In the notebook, click on "New Notebook" on the initial HTML page that pops up in your browser, and type `plot([1,2])` in the first cell of the notebook page, followed by Shift-Enter to see the inline plot:: ipython qtconsole --pylab=inline ipython notebook --pylab=inline ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Keep Your Developer Skills Current with LearnDevNow! The most comprehensive online learning library for Microsoft developers is just $99.99! Visual Studio, SharePoint, SQL - plus HTML5, CSS3, MVC3, Metro Style Apps, more. Free future releases when you subscribe now! http://p.sf.net/sfu/learndevnow-d2d _______________________________________________ Matplotlib-users mailing list Matplotlib-users@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/matplotlib-users
