Thursday, July 14, 2016

Running modern python on Ubuntu LTS

The python version on your Ubunutu LTS may be slightly behind latest, or years behind, depending on the release cycle. Here's how to run a newer python without interfering with the system one.

Note that setting an install prefix is necessary to avoid making this the default system python (which will break cinnamon-settings apps as well as possibly other things). The prefix I chose puts it in a directory with my username.

Download the latest python source and install it:
sudo apt-get install build-essential libreadline-dev libsqlite3-dev
./configure --enable-ipv6 --enable-unicode=ucs4 --prefix=/usr/local/${USER}/
make
sudo make install
Your new python is now in /usr/local/${USER}/bin/python2.7. To use it, specify it in any virtualenvs you create. Make it an alias so you never forget:
alias virtualenv='virtualenv --python=/usr/local/${USER}/bin/python'

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