How to resolve "normal site-packages is not writable" in Python
In Python, the error message “Defaulting to user installation because normal site-packages is not writeable” usually appears when we try to install packages without having the necessary permissions to write to the system-wide site-packages directory.
Occurrence
This commonly occurs in virtual environments or when we lack administrative access.
Error-resolving approaches
To resolve this error, we can use the following approaches:
Using a virtual environment
First, create a virtual environment using tools like venv or virtualenv, using this command in the terminal:
python -m venv myenv
Now, activate the virtual environment using these commands:
source myenv/bin/activate # for Linux/Macmyenv\Scripts\activate.bat # for Windows
Finally, install packages within the virtual environment using this command in the terminal:
pip install package-name
This way, we’ll have write access to the virtual environment’s site-packages directory without requiring system-wide permissions.
In the following terminal command, we're using Python 3.8 to create a new virtual environment named myenv. You just need to run the command pip install flask or any package you want to install.
Specifying a user installation
We can install the package in the user’s local site-packages directory using this command:
pip install package-name --user
Use the --user flag when installing packages to specify a user installation instead of a system-wide installation.
Using a package manager
If you’re using Linux, you can use system-wide package management like apt or yum to install Python packages. Typically, administrative rights are needed for this.
sudo apt install python-package-name # for the apt package managersudo yum install python-package-name # for the yum package manager
These approaches provide us with the necessary write permissions to install packages in a controlled and isolated manner.
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