pip install gives error: Unable to find vcvarsall.

Question

Using pip install zipline on Windows 8 with Python 2.7 gives me the error:

Downloading/unpacking six (from python-dateutil==2.1->delorean->zipline[all])
  Running setup.py egg_info for package six

Installing collected packages: blist, pytz, requests, python-dateutil, six
  Running setup.py install for blist
    building '_blist' extension
    error: Unable to find vcvarsall.bat
    Complete output from command C:\Python27\python.exe -c "import setuptools;__
file__='c:\\users\\ThatsMe\\appdata\\local\\temp\\pip-build-ThatsMe\\blist\\setup.py';ex
ec(compile(open(__file__).read().replace('\r\n', '\n'), __file__, 'exec'))" inst
all --record c:\users\ThatsMe\appdata\local\temp\pip-xvoky2-record\install-record.tx
t --single-version-externally-managed:

running install

running build

running build_py

running build_ext

building '_blist' extension

error: Unable to find vcvarsall.bat

Question: How can the error be resolved? Running pip install zipline[all] gives the same error...

Answer 1

If you are trying to install matplotlib in order to work with graphs on python. Try this link. https://github.com/jbmohler/matplotlib-winbuild. This is a set of scripts to build matplotlib from source on the MS Windows platform.

To build & install matplotlib in your Python, do:

git clone https://github.com/matplotlib/matplotlib
git clone https://github.com/jbmohler/matplotlib-winbuild
$ python matplotlib-winbuild\buildall.py

The build script will auto-detect Python version & 32/64 bit automatically.

Answer 2

You could use ol' good easy_install zipline instead.

easy_install isn't pip but one good aspect of it is the ability to download and install binary packages too, which would free you for the need having VC++ ready. This of course relies of the assumption that the binaries were prepared for your Python version.

UPDATE:

Yes, Pip can install binaries now!

There's a new binary Python archive format (wheel) that is supposed to replace "eggs". Wheels are already supported by pip. This means you'll be able to install zipline with pip without compiling it as soon as someone builds the wheel for your platform and uploads it to PyPI.

Answer 3

Simply because you don't have c++ compiler installed there in your machine, check the following

• Download Microsoft Visual C++ 2008 from this page. That is a generally useful page anyway, so you should probably bookmark it. For Python 3.3+ use MS Visual C++ 2010. Install it.

• Open Windows explorer (the file browser) and search for the location of ‘vcvarsall.bat’ and cut it to your clipboard.

• run regedit from the Windows start key. You will need admin privilges.

• Add a registry entry to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\VisualStudio\9.0\Setup\VC\ProductDir (64 bit Windows) or HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\9.0\Setup\VC\ProductDir (32 bit) as described here.

Hint: 0.9 in the registery directory is the currently installed version of your visual studio, if you running VS 2013, you have to find the path HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\VisualStudio\12.0....

• At the Windows start key, type cmd to get a command shell. If you need to, go to your virtual environment and run activate.bat.

• pip install or whatever you use to install it.

Answer 4

The problem here is the line 292 (Using Python 3.4.3 here) in $python_install_prefix/Lib/distutils/msvc9compiler.py which says:

VERSION = get_build_version()

This only checks for the MSVC version that your python was built with. Just replacing this line with your actual Visual Studio version, eg. 12.0 for MSVC2013

VERSION = 12.0

will fix the issue.

UPDATE: Turns out that there is a good reason why this version is hardcoded. MSVC C runtime is not required to be compatible between major versions. Hence when you use a different VS version you might run into runtime problems. So I advise to use VS 2008 (for Python 2.6 up to 3.2) and VS2010 for (Python 3.3 and later) until this issue is sorted out.

Binary compatibility will arrive with VS 2015 (see here) along with Python 3.5 .

For Python 2.7 users Microsoft released a special Microsoft Visual C++ Compiler for Python 2.7 which can be used without installing the whole VS 2008.

Answer 5

I spent hours researching this vcvarsall.bat as well. Most answers on SO focus on Python 2.7 and / or creating workarounds by modifying system paths. None worked for me. This solution worked out of the box for Python 3.5 and (I think) is the "correct" way of doing it.

1. See this link -- it describes the Windows Compilers to use for different versions of Python: https://wiki.python.org/moin/WindowsCompilers#Microsoft_Visual_C.2B-.2B-_14.0_standalone:_Visual_C.2B-.2B-_Build_Tools_2015_.28x86.2C_x64.2C_ARM.29

2. For Python 3.5, download this: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=49983

3. For me, I had to run C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual C++ Build Tools\Visual C++ x64 Native Build Tools Command Prompt for it to work. From that command prompt, I ran "pip install django_compressor" which was the particular package that was causing me an issue, and it worked perfectly.

Hope this saves someone some time!

Answer 6

I appreciate this might not be the answer to resolving on 3.4 but I tried a huge variety of things to fix this on 3.4 and thought this might be useful if someone is time pressed or doesn't have the know-how to correct it (in my case, work demands).

With exactly the same setup, I found that my installation problems only happened with Python 3.4. When I changed to 2.7, all my issues seemed to be resolved.

We have a rather overzealous security setup though so I'm going to try the same on my home version (still 3.4) and see if I have any more joy. My inclination is that my VS version has somehow been restricted and the answers above should help. If I find anything more tonight I'll add further detail.

This is my first reply, not the most technical I'm afraid!