There are many ways to get Python installed on your computer. If you were going to start fresh, what tools would you use? What if you need to manage multiple versions of Python and virtual environments? What about all the additional tools that make your coding workflow complete? This week on the show, Calvin Hendryx-Parker is here to talk about bootstrapping your Python environment.

Calvin is the co-founder and CTO of Six Feet Up and a Python Web Conference co-organizer. As a consultant, Calvin has set up countless machines to run Python. He configures environments that can scale from in-office projects to distributed cloud-based applications.

We cover tools for installing Python, managing multiple language versions, and configuring virtual environments. Calvin talks about setting up command-line applications in isolated environments. We also discuss traveling with Python on an iPad.

Course Spotlight: Start Managing Multiple Python Versions With pyenv

In this step-by-step course, you’ll learn how to install multiple Python versions and switch between them, including project-specific virtual environments, with ease with pyenv.

Topics:

00:00:00 – Introduction
00:02:42 – Giving talks at IndyPy
00:03:12 – Calvin’s talk “Half a Dozen Ways to Fail at Python”
00:07:41 – Advice on installing Python using Homebrew and pyenv
00:11:48 – The consistency of using a Docker container
00:18:49 – Creating virtual environments and installing packages
00:21:51 – Sponsor: ScoutAPM
00:22:38 – Creating requirements.txt files and moving from pipenv to piptools
00:30:54 – Paying attention to security issues and your software supply chain
00:34:19 – The goal of making a repeatable developer build experience
00:39:30 – Video Course Spotlight
00:40:47 – Using pipx to set up CLI code tools
00:44:52 – Using bpytop to monitor performance
00:46:41 – Tools for using Python on the iPad
00:53:06 – Python Web Conference
00:56:08 – Moving your dotfiles across multiple machines with chezmoi
01:02:22 – Thanks and goodbye

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