How to create a self contained Python Qt app on mac

Question

I've recently started using a mac, and I'm curious about how to make a mac app that uses PyQt and is self-contained.

Can anyone give me any pointers on where to start and what I'll need?

Answer 1

PyInstaller should be pretty good for that -- it's cross-platform (Mac, Windows, Linux) and offers out-of-the-box support for PyQt (among other useful third-party libraries). Now that a good release (1.4) has finally been recognized as stable, and officially released, after a somewhat long hiatus, PyInstaller is fully "back in business" and my favorite packager!-)

Answer 2

Ars Technica did a fantastic article on this exact topic last year.

Check out page 2 of the article How-to:Deploying PyQt applications on Windows and Mac OS X

Quick Summary: It is possible, but time consuming, results in large app bundles, and their are some strange quirks.

This post was written in March of 2009, so the situation might be different.

Answer 3

I've tried the same for some weeks now. Finally i have to say py2app just wont do. I was lucky with pyinstaller1.4. Although you need to add some minor modifications to run flawlessly on OS X. Furthermore the apps it creates are only 1/4 of the size compared to py2app. And most important it works :) And yet another goodie ... it works with the python framework which ships with OS X so there is no need to install python via MacPorts etc.