python distutils include shell scripts in module directory

Question

What is the best way to include a 'helper' shell script in setup.py that is used by a python module? I don't want to include is as a script since it is not run on it's own.

Also, data_files just copies things in the the install path (not the module install path) so that does not really seem like the best route.

I guess the question is: is there a way of including non-python (non-C) scripts/binaries in a python distutils package in a generic way?

Answer 1

Include it in MANIFEST.in, something like this:

include mycode/myscript.sh

Here's an example Python package that uses helper scripts:

https://github.com/pminkov/kubeutils

Take a look at this file, it runs shell scripts: https://github.com/pminkov/kubeutils/blob/master/kubeutils/kutils.py

Answer 2

I don't think there is a way to package a shell script.

For one of my projects I specifically needed a shell script to pass as an argument over subprocess to another tool that will only except a shell script, not a python script.

So I finally hacked around it by having python write myscript.sh out on the the fly.

It looks like this:

bash_script_name = cwd + "/myscript.sh"
bash_script_file_obj = open(bash_script_name, 'w')
bash_script_file_obj.write(text_of_myscript)
bash_script_file_obj.close()
os.chmod(bash_script_name, 0755)

subprocess.call([another_tool, bash_script_name])

os.remove(bash_script_name)

It's not very elegant, but it worked. If you have the choice of writing the script in Python, I would definitely go with that.