Python — cant find pip.ini or pip.conf in Windows
I got Python 2.7.8 installed on my Win7 machine, which comes with pip already pre-installed.
I’m successfully able to install new packages from pip and now I need to add custom repository url to the install list of pip To do so I need to modify pip.ini which is in %APPDATA%\pip\pip.ini according to the Official Manual
However there are no pip folder anywhere (not in Roaming , not in Local , not in LocalLow ) nor there exists PyPa folder in: C:\ProgramData\PyPA\pip\pip.conf Could you tell me where do i search for pip.ini ? how to add foreign repo to the install list?
14 Answers 14
Instead of checking a list of well-known locations, you can ask pip to list the valid locations:
On the same machine, with the same pip version, the valid locations can vary based on the actual Python version.
Environment: Win 7 x64, the HOME environment variable is set to D:\Home
> pip config -v list For variant 'global', will try loading 'C:\ProgramData\pip\pip.ini' For variant 'user', will try loading 'D:\Home\pip\pip.ini' For variant 'user', will try loading 'C:\Users\foobar\AppData\Roaming\pip\pip.ini' For variant 'site', will try loading 'C:\Python37\pip.ini' > pip config -v list For variant 'global', will try loading 'C:\ProgramData\pip\pip.ini' For variant 'user', will try loading 'C:\Users\foobar\pip\pip.ini' For variant 'user', will try loading 'C:\Users\foobar\AppData\Roaming\pip\pip.ini' For variant 'site', will try loading 'C:\Python38\pip.ini' Thank you. This worked. Instead of copying files blindly at %APPDATA%\pip\pip.ini , check which pip path a certain environment is using and create a pip.ini file at that location.
@alexandrul Update: After upgrading Pip from 21.2.4 to the latest version ( 23.0.1 ), your command ( pip config -v list ) worked as described above
Apparently for Windows users pip.ini config file is not created, however can be added manually!
just create new %APPDATA%\pip\pip.ini and content of custom repository:
[install] find-links = https://:@your.repo.com/custom/url Using Python 3.8, I had to manually create the pip folder and the pip.ini file as well. I used it for our corporate proxy settings.
@ValentinGrégoire Where did you create your pip folder and how did you ensure it was picked up when launching? pip config -v list lists a selection of variants.
@QHarr, I created it at the sugested place in this answer ( %APPDATA%\pip\pip.ini ). As for getting picked up, I prayed for it, and it worked.
@QHarr See the answer of alexandrul. You can for example check with an erroneous pip.ini that has no [install] section header. I have installed Anaconda for my user only. Then, both the 2x user variant and the anaconda variant work (error thrown). I have not checked the global variant since I have a user installation.
A bit late, but for reference: Try adding the pip.ini file in %USERPROFILE%\pip\pip.ini (usually: C:\Users\\pip\pip.ini ).
Putting the pip folder directly in the user folder is the what worked for me on Windows 7 and Windows 10 using Python 3. Thanks for the tip, Moshe.
On windows pip.exe looks for «pip.ini» in this order:
C:\ProgramData\pip\pip.ini C:\Users\\pip\pip.ini C:\Users\\AppData\Roaming\pip\pip.ini I’m not sure this is still the case. On my Win7 machine with py3.6.3 when I tried adding [list] . format=columns it only took effect when placed in APPDATA.
That was for 2.7, so you could be right. I had used sysinternals procmon to watch Python.exe was doing; searching in order for access to «pip.ini». Anyone can do the same to ensure the order is still the same: learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/downloads/procmon
I can confirm part of it. I have put an erroneous pip.ini both in C:\Users\
It’s been 7 years, and I think there’s now a better answer for most people — but it does depend on version of pip. For the most recent pips I’m using:
lists where it’s looking and you can decide which location is most useful for what you’ve got in mind. It does look like a fairly recent change: On a year-old docker image I had with pip 20.1 I got «ERROR: Need an action (edit, get, list, set, unset) to perform.» On that system, pip config -v list gave a list of files it would try, this is supposed to be ‘global’, ‘user’ or ‘site’ variants of pip.ini locations.
For Windows 10, for pip 21.2.4 on both 3.9.6 and 3.6.8, I get response below with pip config -v debug , while pip config -v list is silent (unless a pip.ini is found).
global: C:\ProgramData\pip\pip.ini, exists: False site: c:\py\myvenv\pip.ini, exists: False user: C:\Users\myname\pip\pip.ini, exists: False C:\Users\myname\AppData\Roaming\pip\pip.ini, exists: False From a downloaded image I got from dockerhub in June 2021 with pip 21.2.2 and python 3.6.10:
pip config -v debug env_var: env: global: /etc/xdg/pip/pip.conf, exists: False /etc/pip.conf, exists: True global.extra-index-url: http://trynexs:8081/repository/repo_group/simple site: /usr/local/pip.conf, exists: False user: /home/tanhauser/.pip/pip.conf, exists: False /home/tanhauser/.config/pip/pip.conf, exists: False Configuration#
This page explains how the configuration files and environment variables work, and how they are related to pip’s various command line options.
pip config command, which helps manage pip’s configuration.
Configuration Files#
Configuration files can change the default values for command line option. They are written using a standard INI style configuration files.
pip has 3 “levels” of configuration files:
- global : system-wide configuration file, shared across users.
- user : per-user configuration file.
- site : per-environment configuration file; i.e. per-virtualenv.
Location#
pip’s configuration files are located in fairly standard locations. This location is different on different operating systems, and has some additional complexity for backwards compatibility reasons.
In a “pip” subdirectory of any of the paths set in the environment variable XDG_CONFIG_DIRS (if it exists), for example /etc/xdg/pip/pip.conf .
This will be followed by loading /etc/pip.conf .
$HOME/.config/pip/pip.conf , which respects the XDG_CONFIG_HOME environment variable.
The legacy “per-user” configuration file is also loaded, if it exists: $HOME/.pip/pip.conf .
$HOME/Library/Application Support/pip/pip.conf if directory $HOME/Library/Application Support/pip exists else $HOME/.config/pip/pip.conf
The legacy “per-user” configuration file is also loaded, if it exists: $HOME/.pip/pip.conf .
- On Windows 7 and later: C:\ProgramData\pip\pip.ini (hidden but writeable)
- On Windows Vista: Global configuration is not supported.
- On Windows XP: C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\pip\pip.ini
The legacy “per-user” configuration file is also loaded, if it exists: %HOME%\pip\pip.ini
PIP_CONFIG_FILE #
Additionally, the environment variable PIP_CONFIG_FILE can be used to specify a configuration file that’s loaded first, and whose values are overridden by the values set in the aforementioned files. Setting this to os.devnull disables the loading of all configuration files.
Loading order#
When multiple configuration files are found, pip combines them in the following order:
Each file read overrides any values read from previous files, so if the global timeout is specified in both the global file and the per-user file then the latter value will be used.
Naming#
The names of the settings are derived from the long command line option.
As an example, if you want to use a different package index ( —index-url ) and set the HTTP timeout ( —default-timeout ) to 60 seconds, your config file would look like this:
[global] timeout = 60 index-url = https://download.zope.org/ppix
Per-command section#
Each subcommand can be configured optionally in its own section. This overrides the global setting with the same name.
As an example, if you want to decrease the timeout to 10 seconds when running the pip freeze , and use 60 seconds for all other commands:
[global] timeout = 60 [freeze] timeout = 10
Boolean options#
Boolean options like —ignore-installed or —no-dependencies can be set like this:
[install] ignore-installed = true no-dependencies = yes
To enable the boolean options —no-compile , —no-warn-script-location and —no-cache-dir , falsy values have to be used:
[global] no-cache-dir = false [install] no-compile = no no-warn-script-location = false
Repeatable options#
For options which can be repeated like —verbose and —quiet , a non-negative integer can be used to represent the level to be specified:
[global] quiet = 0 verbose = 2
It is possible to append values to a section within a configuration file. This is applicable to appending options like —find-links or —trusted-host , which can be written on multiple lines:
[global] find-links = http://download.example.com [install] find-links = http://mirror1.example.com http://mirror2.example.com trusted-host = mirror1.example.com mirror2.example.com
This enables users to add additional values in the order of entry for such command line arguments.
Environment Variables#
pip’s command line options can be set with environment variables using the format PIP_ . Dashes ( — ) have to be replaced with underscores ( _ ).
PIP_FIND_LINKS="http://mirror1.example.com http://mirror2.example.com"
--find-links=http://mirror1.example.com --find-links=http://mirror2.example.com
Repeatable options that do not take a value (such as —verbose ) can be specified using the number of repetitions:
Environment variables set to an empty string (like with export X= on Unix) will not be treated as false. Use no , false or 0 instead.
Precedence / Override order#
Command line options override environment variables, which override the values in a configuration file. Within the configuration file, values in command-specific sections override values in the global section.
- —host=foo overrides PIP_HOST=foo
- PIP_HOST=foo overrides a config file with [global] host = foo
- A command specific section in the config file [] host = bar overrides the option with same name in the [global] config file section.
location of pip.conf file
I am working on a system that has to work on both Windows and Linux. Its uses Python’s venv module for everything related to Python. I need to create a pip.conf file to activate the pickup of my personal ~/.pip/pip.conf to point it to our internal PyPi server instead of the global one. I also need to be able to hard code the values right into the venv ‘s pip.conf for other scenarios. I can’t figure out where the file should be placed. In short, sometimes I need it to use my personal pip.conf , sometimes I need it to use the venv ‘s pip.conf , on both Linux and Windows (my machine is Windows). The folder structure of my venv after creation is this:
myproject/build/venv/Include /Lib /Scripts Where does the pip.conf go? I keep reading in the documentation %virtual_env%/pip.conf but when you don’t know what the value of virtual_env, its a pretty useless statement. My guess is myproject/build/venv/pip.conf , am I right? edit** Well, I was wrong. Putting it in the root of the venv folder didn’t work. I’m going to keep trying, problem is to redeploy this app after each code change takes an hour.
i haven’t tried yet. its an automated process, not a console and changing it is a bitch. I only want to do it once if i can
That’s an unusual venv setup. The common way to do it is to have one umbrella directory housing all venvs. A popular location for this (e.g. that’s how «oh-my-zsh» does it) is ~/.virtualenvs/ . Your «myproject» virtualenv would then be at ~/.virtualenvs/myproject/ and your pip config thus at ~/.virtualenvs/myproject/pip.conf . Your project itself would be in its own directory elsewhere, e.g. ~/projects/myproject/ . It may additionally (quite optional) have a .venv file that explicitly specifies its virtualenv’s location.