Ambiguity on Python Installation

Question

So I am new to Python and installed it using guidelines from various websites, as I want to try basic examples before moving on the advanced python concepts. Below is my understanding and installation tasks that I performed.

1) Installed Python 2.7 form the website.

2) Installed Anaconda as I read that it has pre installed libraries.

3) Downloaded pip file and ran it on the Python interpreter and it was done successfully, but when I try using pip install ipython , it throws an error saying pip is not defined.

4)Now I downloaded Pycharm as a IDE, done successfully.

5) Programs run perfectly, but I see many instances of Ipthon on every related website and I am not able to understand if I need it. Ipython is used for web I guess but I really don't understand how to integrate everything. Please guide me.

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

If you are using windows, pip error is probably related to environmental variables not being set.

See this answer for details on pip Adding Python Path on Windows 7

---

response to comment

Ipython is not necessary, but it will make life easier. I use command prompt and am not familiar with installing packages with Pycharm or anaconda.

If Pip is installed, and the Windows environmental variable is not set, you can still use pip.

1) open a windows command prompt as administrator 2) navigate to your python installation ( default Directory is C:\\Python27 ) 3) navigate to scripts folder (default dir C:\\Python27\\Scripts) 4) type 'pip'

5) type 'pip freeze' to see packages installed with pip. Note: pip does not keep track of packages installed with conda

If you were able to complete those steps, changing the PATH variable to include the scripts directory will allow you to run pip by simply typing 'pip' from anywhere.

To install Ipython: From command prompt with administrator rights: 'pip install ipython[all]'