There’s a fair chance your first attempt to use PyInstaller to package an app won’t be completely successful. These will be left out of the created bundle to save space.

spec file is used to create an executable with PyInstaller. The bundle will typically need to be extracted in a directory where the user has write permissions in order to run. exe file to run, along with all of the libraries and other supplemental files required.Īll you need to do to distribute your program, then, is package up this directory as a. This in turn contains a directory that is your bundled app - it has an.

When it’s finished, a subfolder named dist (by default you are free to specify a different name) will appear in the project directory. Don’t discard this file it’s the key to refining a PyInstaller deployment!įinally, PyInstaller attempts to produce an executable from the app, bundled with all its dependencies. The first time you run PyInstaller on your app, PyInstaller will generate a spec file from scratch and populate it with some sane defaults. spec, this file includes details about how your Python app needs to be packed up. (More on this later.)Īfter analyzing your code and discovering all of the libraries and modules it uses, PyInstaller then generates a “spec file.” A Python script with the extension. PyInstaller can detect and automatically package many common Python packages, like NumPy, but you might need to provide hints in some cases. For instance, if your program’s entry point is myapp.py, you would run pyinstaller myapp.py to perform the analysis. PyInstaller reads in your program from its entry point. PyInstaller works by reading your Python program, analyzing all of the imports it makes, and bundling copies of those imports with your program. PyInstaller can be installed in your default Python installation, but it’s best to create a virtual environment for the project you want to package and install PyInstaller there. PyInstaller is a Python package, installed with pip ( pip install pyinstaller). In this article we’ll explore the basics of using PyInstaller including how PyInstaller works, how to use PyInstaller to create a standalone Python executable, how to fine-tune the Python executables you create, and how to avoid some of the common pitfalls that go with using PyInstaller.

Py installer