How to import your package/modules from a script in bin folder in python

Question

When organising python project, this structure seems to be a standard way of doing it:

myproject
    bin
        myscript
    mypackage
        __init__.py
        core.py
    tests
        __init__.py
        mypackage_tests.py
setup.py

My question is, how do I import my core.py so I can use it in myscript?

both __init__.py files are empty.

Content of myscript:

#!/usr/bin/env python
from mypackage import core
if __name__ == '__main__':
    core.main()

Content of core.py

def main():
    print 'hello'

When I run myscript from inside myproject directory, I get the following error:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "bin/myscript", line 2, in <module>
    from mypackage import core
ImportError: No module named mypackage

What am I missing?

Asked By: tim_wonil

||

Source

Answer 1

Usually, setup.py should install the package in a place where the Python interpreter can find it, so after installation import mypackage will work. To facilitate running the scripts in bin right from the development tree, I’d usually simply add a simlink to ../mypackage/ to the bin directory. Of course, this requires a filesystem supporting symlinks…

Answered By: Sven Marnach

Answer 2

I’m not sure if there is a “best choice”, but the following is my normal practice:

Put whatever script I wanna run in /bin
do “python -m bin.script” in the dir myproject
When importing in script.py, consider the dir in which script.py is sitting as root. So
```
from ..mypackage import core
```

If the system supports symlink, it’s a better choice.

Answered By: Patrick the Cat

Answer 3

I usually add my bin path into $PYTHONPATH, that will enable python to look for asked module in bin directory too.

export PYTHONPATH=/home/username/bin:$PYTHONPATH
$ python
import module_from_bin

Answered By: Sufyan

Answer 4

I solved the issue following setuptools specifications.

In setup.py you can specify the modules as an argument for the function setup():

packages = find_packages()

This finds all modules.

p.s. you have to import this function: from setuptools import setup, find_packages

Answered By: aerijman

How to import your package/modules from a script in bin folder in python

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