{"id":1374,"date":"2018-11-15T18:18:39","date_gmt":"2018-11-15T10:18:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.techcoil.com\/blog\/?p=1374"},"modified":"2021-01-10T13:07:38","modified_gmt":"2021-01-10T05:07:38","slug":"how-to-use-a-python-3-virtual-environment-in-windows-10","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.techcoil.com\/blog\/how-to-use-a-python-3-virtual-environment-in-windows-10\/","title":{"rendered":"How to use a Python 3 virtual environment in Windows 10"},"content":{"rendered":"

When you need each Python 3 application that you are building to run in its own isolated environment, you can turn to virtual environments<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Since Python is available on Windows 10, you can also use virtual environments on Windows 10.<\/p>\n

Typically, using a Python 3 virtual environment in Windows 10 involves the following steps:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Installing Python 3 with pip and several features.<\/li>\n
  2. Creating a Python 3 virtual environment with Python 3 venv module.<\/li>\n
  3. Activating the Python 3 virtual environment.<\/li>\n
  4. Installing Python 3 packages that your Python application is using into the virtual environment.<\/li>\n
  5. Running your Python 3 application within the Python 3 virtual environment.<\/li>\n
  6. Deactivating the Python 3 virtual environment.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    1. Installing Python 3 with pip and several features on Windows 10<\/h2>\n

    When you head over to the Python 3 download page for windows<\/a>, you will find several options:<\/p>\n

    \"Python<\/p>\n

    Next, determine whether your Windows 10 operating is 32 bit or 64 bit<\/a>. When you have a 32 bit operating system, download the latest executable installer with x86<\/strong>. However, if you have a 64 bit operating system, download the one with x86-64<\/strong>. <\/p>\n

    For example, if I have Windows 10 64 bit, I can download Windows x86-64 executable installer for Python 3.7.1 runtime<\/a>.<\/p>\n

    After you had downloaded the Python 3 installer, double-click on it. Choose to Add Python 3.7 to PATH:<\/p>\n

    \"Python <\/p>\n

    Left-click on Customize installation<\/strong>. After the next screen appears, check pip<\/strong>:<\/p>\n

    \"Python<\/p>\n

    Left-click on Next<\/strong> and the Advanced Options screen appears:<\/p>\n

    \"Python<\/p>\n

    Finally, left-click on Install<\/strong> to start the installation progress:<\/p>\n

    \"Python<\/p>\n

    When the installation had completed, you will see the following screen:<\/p>\n

    \"Python<\/p>\n

    Left-click on Close<\/strong> to exit the installation wizard.<\/p>\n

    2. Creating a Python 3 virtual environment with Python 3 venv module on Windows 10<\/h2>\n

    When you had installed Python 3 on Windows 10, you can then create the virtual environment for your Python 3 application. In order to do so, open up a command prompt window and type the following command:<\/p>\n

    \r\npython -m venv %systemdrive%%homepath%\\my-venv\r\n<\/pre>\n
    After the command completes, you will find the my-venv<\/code> directory inside your home directory. Inside the my-venv<\/code>, you will find the Python artefacts to work with your virtual environment.<\/p>\n
    3. Activating your Python 3 virtual environment on Windows 10<\/h2>\n
    Before you can run your Python 3 application inside of your Python 3 virtual environment, you will need to activate it. In order to activate your virtual environment, you will need to run the activate.bat<\/code> script located inside your virtual environment directory. <\/p>\n
    For example, to activate the virtual environment inside my-venv<\/code>, you can run the following command in your command prompt window:<\/p>\n
    \r\n%systemdrive%%homepath%\\my-venv\\Scripts\\activate.bat\r\n<\/pre>\n
    After the activate.bat<\/code> script had ran, you will see the prompt appended with (my-venv)<\/strong>:<\/p>\n
    \"Windows<\/p>\n
    This tells us that the command prompt session is inside the Python 3 virtual environment.<\/p>\n
    4. Installing Python 3 packages that your Python application is using into the virtual environment.<\/h2>\n
    When you had activated your virtual environment, you can then install your Python 3 dependencies into your Python 3 virtual environment on Windows 10. For example, you can install the requests library<\/a> for your Python 3 application to download a file from a HTTP server<\/a> or upload a file to a HTTP server<\/a>:<\/p>\n
    \r\npip install requests\r\n<\/pre>\n
    In order to use the pip command, you need to ensure that you had installed it during your Python 3 installation.<\/p>\n
    5. Running your Python 3 application within the Python 3 virtual environment<\/h2>\n
    Subsequently, when you had installed all the needed dependencies, you can then run your Python 3 application with the python<\/strong> binary:<\/p>\n
    \r\npython a_python_application.py\r\n<\/pre>\n
    6. Deactivating the Python 3 virtual environment on Windows 10<\/h2>\n
    When you want to get out of your Python 3 virtual environment on Windows 10, you can simply run the following command:<\/p>\n
    \r\ndeactivate\r\n<\/pre>\n
    After the virtual environment is deactivated, your command prompt will switch to the global Python 3 environment. In addition, those Python 3 dependencies that you had installed in your virtual environment will not be available.<\/p>\n\n