distutils and building an distribution that includes other packages

[Chris Rebert]

> "Chris Rebert" <clp2 at rebertia.com> wrote in message
> news:mailman.426.1242792992.8015.python-list at python.org...
>> On Tue, May 19, 2009 at 8:55 PM, Paul Hemans <darwin at nowhere.com> wrote:
>>> Hi,
>>> I am new to Python, and after a lot of sweat and tears, I have my first
>>> app.
>>> Now I need to deploy it to end-users. The application includes the use of
>>> lxml and sqlAlchemy so I need those to install automatically as part of
>>> the
>>> installation process. I really don't want the users having to download
>>> various modules and install them. Is this facility (to download and
>>> install
>>> other packages seamlessly) part of distutils? If so, I have been looking
>>> around for a simple tutorial on the topic but haven't found anything yet.
>>> Can anyone point me to some information?
>>
>> Since I'm guessing your platform is Windows, you'll probably be
>> interested in py2exe - http://www.py2exe.org/
>>
>> Cheers,
>> Chris
On Tue, May 19, 2009 at 9:31 PM, Paul Hemans <darwin at nowhere.com> wrote:
> Hi Chris,
> Yes I do intend to use py2exe for windows installation but I don't
> understand how it will help me distribute lxml and sqlAlchemy as part of the
> install, or am I missing something?

Granted I haven't used Windows (and thus py2exe) in a while, but last
I recall the executable it produced was a self-contained Python
executable containing the main script and all its necessary
modules/libraries. I think there were some issues getting it to
include certain finnicky third-party libraries, but once tweaked
properly it could be coaxed to include them.

Thus, you don't need to install/distribute the libraries at all;
they'll be included as part of the generated executable. Then to
distribute/install your program, you just copy the executable (and
maybe a DLL or two, again it's been a while).

Cheers,
Chris
-- 
http://blog.rebertia.com