Relative imports for the billionth time

Script vs. Module Here’s an explanation. The short version is that there is a big difference between directly running a Python file, and importing that file from somewhere else. Just knowing what directory a file is in does not determine what package Python thinks it is in. That depends, additionally, on how you load the … Read more

What is setup.py?

setup.py is a python file, the presence of which is an indication that the module/package you are about to install has likely been packaged and distributed with Distutils, which is the standard for distributing Python Modules. This allows you to easily install Python packages. Often it’s enough to write: $ pip install . pip will … Read more

What is __init__.py for?

It used to be a required part of a package (old, pre-3.3 “regular package”, not newer 3.3+ “namespace package”). Here’s the documentation. Python defines two types of packages, regular packages and namespace packages. Regular packages are traditional packages as they existed in Python 3.2 and earlier. A regular package is typically implemented as a directory … Read more