Cannot use paths with spaces in them

[Jamie Kirkpatrick]

If you try to initialise a virtualenv in a path which contains spaces, easy_install will not run.

Suggested fix: quote path names when setting up the environment.

[Ian Bicking (ianb)]

I attempted to fix this in r3604, but I can't test (no Windows system). Can you confirm if this works? Just grab the trunk: http://svn.colorstudy.com/virtualenv/trunk/virtualenv.py

[yvesm (yves-moisan)]

I tested it today and it does not work. virtualenv_win32.py is the trunk version as of today and it outputs the same error as the virtualenv.py that comes with Virtualenv 1.3.2 :

C:\Program Files\My Dir>"C:\Program Files\My Dir\Python25\python" "C:\Program Files\My Dir\Python25\Lib\site-packages\virtualenv_win32.py" --no-site-packages "C:\Program Files\My Dir\TileCache"

New python executable in C:\Program Files\My Dir\TileCache\Scripts\python.exe
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:\Program Files\My Dir\Python25\Lib\site-packages\virtualenv_win32.py", line 1208, in <module>
    main()
  File "C:\Program Files\My Dir\Python25\Lib\site-packages\virtualenv_win32.py", line 420, in main
    unzip_setuptools=options.unzip_setuptools)
  File "C:\Program Files\My Dir\Python25\Lib\site-packages\virtualenv_win32.py", line 663, in create_environment
    stdout=subprocess.PIPE)

  File "C:\Program Files\My Dir\Python25\lib\subprocess.py", line 594, in __init__
    errread, errwrite)

  File "C:\Program Files\My Dir\Python25\lib\subprocess.py", line 816, in _execute_child
    startupinfo)

WindowsError: [Error 3] The system cannot find the path specified

[Ian Bicking (ianb)]

I've committed what I think is a fix (untested on Windows) in r3795. This normalizes the path name using win32api.GetShortPathName which should remove the space.

Please confirm if this resolves the issue.

[AF (af09)]

I am seeing this on Ubuntu 9.04 using both the version in the Ubuntu repo and r3879 as downloaded from http://svn.colorstudy.com/virtualenv/trunk

[AF (af09)]

To clarify:

The error I am seeing is:
bash: /media/Path with Spaces Drive/virt/bin/easy_install: " /media/Path: bad interpreter: No such file or directory

[peter (pkoppatz)]

Installed python26 and easy_install on Windows XP SP2

C:\home>virtualenv xxx
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:\Python26\Scripts\virtualenv-script.py", line 8, in <module>
    load_entry_point('virtualenv==1.3.3', 'console_scripts', 'virtualenv')()
  File "C:\Python26\lib\site-packages\virtualenv-1.3.3-py2.6.egg\virtualenv.py",
 line 420, in main
    unzip_setuptools=options.unzip_setuptools)
  File "C:\Python26\lib\site-packages\virtualenv-1.3.3-py2.6.egg\virtualenv.py",
 line 499, in create_environment
    home_dir, lib_dir, inc_dir, bin_dir = path_locations(home_dir)
  File "C:\Python26\lib\site-packages\virtualenv-1.3.3-py2.6.egg\virtualenv.py",
 line 521, in path_locations
    import win32api
ImportError: No module named win32api

Now I replaced virtualenv.py from the egg with the version from:

http://svn.colorstudy.com/virtualenv/trunk/

Next Error:

C:\home>virtualenv xxx
New python executable in xxx\Scripts\python.exe
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:\Python26\Scripts\virtualenv-script.py", line 8, in <module>
    load_entry_point('virtualenv==1.3.3', 'console_scripts', 'virtualenv')()
  File "C:\Python26\lib\site-packages\virtualenv-1.3.3-py2.6.egg\virtualenv.py",
 line 420, in main
    unzip_setuptools=options.unzip_setuptools)
  File "C:\Python26\lib\site-packages\virtualenv-1.3.3-py2.6.egg\virtualenv.py",
 line 503, in create_environment
    site_packages=site_packages, clear=clear)
  File "C:\Python26\lib\site-packages\virtualenv-1.3.3-py2.6.egg\virtualenv.py",
 line 643, in install_python
    pythonw = os.path.join(os.path.dirname(sys.executable, 'pythonw.exe'))
TypeError: dirname() takes exactly 1 argument (2 given)

Replaced the following lines...

virtualenv.py: Line 642-647 with:

        if sys.platform == 'win32' or sys.platform == 'cygwin':
            pythonw = sys.executable
            if os.path.exists(pythonw):
                logger.info('Also created pythonw.exe')
                shutil.copyfile(pythonw, py_executable)

Now it works.

[Jamie Kirkpatrick (jamiekp)]

I second what peter found. His fix also works for me: can this be applied to the trunk please?

Thanks

Jamie

[Don Spaulding II (donspauldingii)]

The simplest solution that works seems to be changing:

os.path.join(os.path.dirname(sys.executable, 'pythonw.exe'))

To:

os.path.join(os.path.dirname(sys.executable), 'pythonw.exe')

On lines 643 and 646 of virtualenv.py in trunk.

[Chris McNabb (raizyr)]

I'm also having this problem on Mac, since the problem isn't specific to windows, perhaps there's a solution that isn't dependent on sys.platform == 'win32' or 'cygwin'

[Chris McNabb (raizyr)]

on further reflection, the problem AF and I are having is slightly different, the initialization of a new virtualenv works, however running easy_install after activiating that virtualenv results in an error

(virtualenv)triumph:python raizyr$ easy_install twisted
-bash: /Users/raizyr/Library/Application Support/TextMate/Bundles/Hswi.tmbundle/Support/python/virtualenv/bin/easy_install: "/Users/raizyr/Library/Application: bad interpreter: No such file or directory

[Chris McNabb (raizyr)]

Okay, it seems the "bad interpreter" error is a bash thing, it doesn't allow spaces in the interpreter path.

Here's a thread discussing it, http://<email address hidden>/msg03969.html

A workaround is simply to call the script with python

(virtualenv)triumph:python raizyr$ python virtualenv/bin/easy_install twisted

[Carl Meyer (carljm)]

Considering this a "wontfix" and not migrating to new tracker at https://github.com/pypa/virtualenv/issues - shebang lines can't include paths with spaces, it's unlikely this will ever change, and I don't see a reasonable way for virtualenv to work around this. Calling the scripts with the python binary is a reasonable end-user workaround.