Python-mode import problem

Question

I'm trying to use Emacs as a python editor and it works fine when I evaluate(C-c C-c) only single files but when I evaluate a file that imports another file in the same directory, I get an error saying that the file could not be imported.

Does anyone know of a workaround?

Thanks in advance

edit: Btw, i'm using Emacs23 on a Ubuntu machine.

The error was,

  ImportError: No module named hlutils 

Answer 1

Open a terminal and type emacs -q. This starts an emacs without loading the init file (.emacs). Does the same behavior occur? If not, then it means there is a problem in your .emacs file.

Edit:

When you run a script using C-c C-c from within Emacs' Python mode, the directory containing the script is not added to the beginning of sys.path. I found this out by putting

import sys
print sys.path

at the top of a test script. This is why Python is not finding other modules that reside in the same directory.

When you run the script from the command-line, Python does add the directory containing the script to sys.path. That's why the same script works from the command-line.

You can fix this by editing your ~/.bashrc file and adding

export PYTHONPATH=/path/to/Python/scripts

After saving ~/.bashrc, close emacs and start it again to make sure the change to .bashrc becomes effective.

Answer 2

I am really quite bad with emacs lisp, and I have never used Ubuntu, so the following may require some tweaking, but if the code runs fine from the shell, why not just set emacs to run the shell command? Just put:

(defun shell-compile ()
  (interactive)
  (shell-command (concat "python " (buffer-file-name))))

(add-hook 'python-mode-hook
          (lambda () (local-set-key (kbd "\C-c\C-c") 'shell-compile)))

into your .emacs file. There must be much cleaner ways to do it, but this will at least get you working.

Answer 3

i import local modules from the same directiory just fine when using py-execute-buffer.

your problem might be related to the way py-execute-buffer goes about its work: it saves the buffer to a tmp file (in the directory py-temp-directory) and then it passes this file to python. in your case the system might be affected by the temp file directory.

another aspect: py-execute-buffer does different things with the tmp file depending whether a pyhton interpreter buffer does exist or does not: try your case with a running interperter and with out (just kill the interpreter buffer).

Answer 4

I think the problem is in the way Emacs' python-mode runs Python. If I type M-x run-python, then I see this:

>>> import sys
>>> '' in sys.path
False
>>> 

whereas if I run the python interpreter from the shell, I see:

>>> import sys
>>> '' in sys.path
True
>>> 

This seems to be due to the following code in run-python from progmodes/python.el:

(let* ((cmdlist
    (append (python-args-to-list cmd)
        '("-i" "-c" "import sys; sys.path.remove('')")))

which has no comment, and the following helpful ChangeLog entry:

2008-08-24  Romain Francoise  <[email protected]>

        * progmodes/python.el (run-python): Remove '' from sys.path.

I would say this is a bug in Emacs. Here's a workaround that you could put in your .emacs file:

(defun python-reinstate-current-directory ()
  "When running Python, add the current directory ('') to the head of sys.path.
For reasons unexplained, run-python passes arguments to the
interpreter that explicitly remove '' from sys.path. This means
that, for example, using `python-send-buffer' in a buffer
visiting a module's code will fail to find other modules in the
same directory.

Adding this function to `inferior-python-mode-hook' reinstates
the current directory in Python's search path."
  (python-send-string "sys.path[0:0] = ['']"))

(add-hook 'inferior-python-mode-hook 'python-reinstate-current-directory)