Easy_install and pip broke: pkg_resources.Distribu

Question

I was tried to upgrade pip with pip install --upgrade pip on OSX and pip and easy_install both dont work.

When running pip

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/local/bin/pip", line 5, in <module>
    from pkg_resources import load_entry_point
  File "/usr/local/Cellar/python/2.7.4/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/lib/python2.7/site-packages/distribute-0.6.49-py2.7.egg/pkg_resources.py", line 2881, in <module>
    parse_requirements(__requires__), Environment()
  File "/usr/local/Cellar/python/2.7.4/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/lib/python2.7/site-packages/distribute-0.6.49-py2.7.egg/pkg_resources.py", line 596, in resolve
    raise DistributionNotFound(req)
pkg_resources.DistributionNotFound: pip==1.3.1

When running easy_install

  File "/usr/local/bin/easy_install", line 5, in <module>
    from pkg_resources import load_entry_point
  File "/usr/local/Cellar/python/2.7.4/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/lib/python2.7/site-packages/distribute-0.6.49-py2.7.egg/pkg_resources.py", line 2881, in <module>
    parse_requirements(__requires__), Environment()
  File "/usr/local/Cellar/python/2.7.4/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/lib/python2.7/site-packages/distribute-0.6.49-py2.7.egg/pkg_resources.py", line 596, in resolve
    raise DistributionNotFound(req)
pkg_resources.DistributionNotFound: distribute==0.6.36

How can I fix this?

UPDATE I found the solution.

I did cd /usr/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages && ls

found pip-1.4.1-py2.7.egg-info and distribute-0.6.49-py2.7.egg in the directory.

Then the following steps fixed the issue.

1. Changed the pip version to 1.4.1 in /usr/local/bin/pip

2. Changed distribute version to 0.6.49 in /usr/local/bin/easy_install

---

The answers on other such questions to curl ez_setup.py and install setuptools from it didnt work. It gave the following error.

Downloading https://pypi.python.org/packages/source/s/setuptools/setuptools-1.1.6.tar.gz
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 370, in <module>
  File "<stdin>", line 366, in main
  File "<stdin>", line 278, in download_setuptools
  File "<stdin>", line 185, in download_file_curl
  File "/usr/local/Cellar/python/2.7.4/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/lib/python2.7/subprocess.py", line 542, in check_call
    raise CalledProcessError(retcode, cmd)
subprocess.CalledProcessError: Command '['curl', 'https://pypi.python.org/packages/source/s/setuptools/setuptools-1.1.6.tar.gz', '--silent', '--output', '/usr/bin/setuptools-1.1.6.tar.gz']' returned non-zero exit status 23

Answer 1

I was in the middle of migrating from OSX system python to homebrew python, and was having the same error. Upgrading the homebrew python version (running brew upgrade python) did the thing for me.

Answer 2

None of the other answers worked for me. It was much simpler with these instructions. I had installed an extra copy of easy_install at /usr/local/bin/easy_install and /usr/local/bin/easy_install-2.7. I am pretty sure I did so following instructions here and in other places. The solution for me was to delete these two instances:

rm /usr/local/bin/easy_install
rm /usr/local/bin/easy_install-2.7

and then reinstall pip with

sudo easy_install --upgrade pip

Some background: I got to this point after having to reinstall OSX.