pip3.4 -V refers to python2.7 installation

Question

Edit-rephrased question to be less misleading

Is there a difference between pip3 and pip2? pip2 -V and pip3-V both produce the output

pip 7.1.0 from /usr/lib/python2.7/site-packages (python 2.7)

Old question below

I have seen recommendations to set up a python3 virtualenv using pip3, but when I type

pip3.4 -V

I get the output

pip 7.1.0 from /usr/lib/python2.7/site-packages (python 2.7)

Which is exactly the same output I get from pip -V and pip2 -V. My python3 installation works fine. What's the deal? Is pip, pip2, and pip3, actually the same thing? Afterall https://pip.pypa.io/en/stable/index.html, only mentions pip. Furthermore strangely, in my /usr/bin folder, I can see my pip3 is older than my pip3.4 binary -- which explains why pip3 -V fails with

pkg_resources.DistributionNotFound: pip==1.5.6

So what is the deal? is the pip3 syntax redundant, or is there something wrong with my system? I use opensuse 13.2

Answer 1

In Debian, I found three short files in /usr/local/bin: pip; pip3; and pip3.4. All were identical:

#!/usr/bin/python

# -*- coding: utf-8 -*-
import re
import sys

from pip import main

if __name__ == '__main__':
    sys.argv[0] = re.sub(r'(-script\.pyw|\.exe)?$', '', sys.argv[0])
    sys.exit(main())

By changing the very first shebang line of pip3 (with sudo) to

#!/usr/bin/python3

Then ensuring that the original pip was explicitly

#!/usr/bin/python2

All of my similar confusion and errors disappeared.

Answer 2

I was struggling with the same issue on my EC2 and finally found the solution to it. You can use it in following way-

python3 -m pip <install> <library>

adding python3 -m before pip calls pip3 from the correct location. You can check its location as follows-

python3 -m pip -V
pip 19.0.1 from /usr/local/lib/python3.6/site-packages/pip (python 3.6)

Answer 3

You can use --python=python3 flag to specify the Python version you want to use.

Answer 4

After reinstalling python3-pip (opensuse package) pip3 -V and pip3.4 -V produce correct output

pip 7.1.0 from /usr/lib/python3.4/site-packages (python 3.4)

I had actually also uninstalled pip2 in the process and strangely reinstalling pip2 with python get-pip (get-pip) changed my newly working pip3.4 to point to the python2 site-packages again. This I just changed by deleting the wrong pip3.4 and making a symlink to pip3