Python IDLE is not starting on Windows 7

Question

I used to use Python 2.7 and then IDLE was working. I uninstalled it and installed Python 3.1.
Right now Idle cannot launch. What should i do to get it running?

NOTE: I tried c:\Python31\pythonw.exe c:\Python31\Lib\idlelib\idle.py
i uninstalled 3.1 and installed back 2.7, not working neither...

Answer 1

My system is Win7/64 Enterprise edition and the Python version is 2.7.3 (I need this one...). This is what I got when I ran idle.py from the command window:

"
C:\Python27\Lib\idlelib>idle.py
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:\Python27\Lib\idlelib\idle.py", line 11, in <module>
    idlelib.PyShell.main()
  File "C:\Python27\Lib\idlelib\PyShell.py", line 1406, in main
    root = Tk(className="Idle")
  File "C:\Python27\lib\lib-tk\Tkinter.py", line 1685, in __init__
    self.tk = _tkinter.create(screenName, baseName, className, interactive, want
objects, useTk, sync, use)
_tkinter.TclError: Can't find a usable init.tcl in the following directories:
    {C:\Program Files (x86)\CSR\BlueSuite 2.5.0} C:/Python27/lib/tcl8.5 C:/lib/t
cl8.5 C:/lib/tcl8.5 C:/library C:/library C:/tcl8.5.2/library C:/tcl8.5.2/librar
y

This probably means that Tcl wasn't installed properly.
"

Indeed there was no "tcl8.5" folder in any of the listed above place but it was under: "C:\Python27\tcl".

When I copied it under "C:\Python27\lib" then IDLE started (with some other warnings but this seems related to my corp environment...)

In conclusion this looks like either an installer failing to copy the folder where it is supposed to or failing to set up some environment variables correctly or there's an actual bug int the release likely to show up on Win7/64 on certain edition(s). I am not a Python expert enough to debug Python itself, so please somebody take it from here...in the meantime I will see if the "workaround" is good enough :-)

Answer 2

Just try to delete the files which end with .idlerc in your profile.

1. Enter <win-r>, and type %USERPROFILE%\.idlerc
2. delete all files in idlerc folder
3. it works on my PC(win7 OS)

Answer 3

Once I copied the C:\Python27\tcl\tcl8.5 folder to C:\Python27\Lib as suggested in Bogdan's answer the error message "This probably means that Tcl wasn't installed properly" went away. Instead I started seeing "This probably means that tk wasn't installed properly". I had to copy the C:\Python27\tcl\tk8.5 folder to C:\Python27\Lib as well. Once I did that running idle.py from the command line in C:\Python27\Lib\idlelib was error-free.

Answer 4

I got the same problem on window 10. Steps to solve the problem:

1. Locate the .idlerc folder in your profile directory (e.g. C:\Users\{your-username} without the braces).
2. Delete the .idlerc directory.

It worked for me...