#1642 spyder-xxx-p27 does not work

[Maurizio De Pitta']

System:
ProductName: Mac OS X
ProductVersion: 10.9.3
BuildVersion: 13D65

Fink:
Package manager version: 0.36.4.1
Distribution version: selfupdate-rsync Thu May 22 17:46:02 2014, 10.9, x86_64

Xcode 5.1.1 (but Command Line Tools by Xcode 5.0.2)

Packages: spyder-mac-p27, spyder-x11-p27

Description:
1. Installed python/numpy/scipy/ipython by fink. Clean and smooth installation: Ipython console and notebook with inline plotting work perfectly.
2. Then installed by fink spyder-mac-p27 (or alternatively spyder-x11-p27). When invoked from bash, it gives an error with PyQt4 (although already installed), and cannot even launch sometimes. When it opens it cannot load also an IPython console (says it needs a version of IPython <1.0 while current one is >2.0).

Error messages:
From terminal, when spyder is launched:

/sw/lib/python2.7/site-packages/IPython/frontend.py:30: UserWarning: The top-level frontend package has been deprecated. All its subpackages have been moved to the top IPython level.
warn("The top-level frontend package has been deprecated. "
libpng warning: iCCP: Not recognizing known sRGB profile that has been edited
libpng warning: iCCP: Not recognizing known sRGB profile that has been edited
libpng warning: iCCP: Not recognizing known sRGB profile that has been edited
libpng warning: iCCP: Not recognizing known sRGB profile that has been edited
libpng warning: iCCP: Not recognizing known sRGB profile that has been edited
libpng warning: iCCP: Not recognizing known sRGB profile that has been edited
libpng warning: iCCP: Not recognizing known sRGB profile that has been edited
2014-05-23 22:46:30.512 python2.7[1724:507] CoreText performance note: Client called CTFontCreateWithName() using name "Lucida Grande" and got font with PostScript name "LucidaGrande". For best performance, only use PostScript names when calling this API.
2014-05-23 22:46:30.512 python2.7[1724:507] CoreText performance note: Set a breakpoint on CTFontLogSuboptimalRequest to debug.
libpng warning: iCCP: Not recognizing known sRGB profile that has been edited
libpng warning: iCCP: Not recognizing known sRGB profile that has been edited
libpng warning: iCCP: Not recognizing known sRGB profile that has been edited
libpng warning: iCCP: Not recognizing known sRGB profile that has been edited
libpng warning: iCCP: Not recognizing known sRGB profile that has been edited
libpng warning: iCCP: Not recognizing known sRGB profile that has been edited
libpng warning: iCCP: Not recognizing known sRGB profile that has been edited
libpng warning: iCCP: Not recognizing known sRGB profile that has been edited
libpng warning: iCCP: Not recognizing known sRGB profile that has been edited
libpng warning: iCCP: Not recognizing known sRGB profile that has been edited
libpng warning: iCCP: Not recognizing known sRGB profile that has been edited
libpng warning: iCCP: Not recognizing known sRGB profile that has been edited
libpng warning: iCCP: Not recognizing known sRGB profile that has been edited

Within the spyder-python shell instead:

Traceback (most recent call last):
File "/sw/lib/python2.7/site-packages/spyderlib/scientific_startup.py", line 16, in <module>
from pylab import * #analysis:ignore
File "/sw/lib/python2.7/site-packages/pylab.py", line 1, in <module>
from matplotlib.pylab import
File "/sw/lib/python2.7/site-packages/matplotlib/pylab.py", line 269, in <module>
from matplotlib.pyplot import
File "/sw/lib/python2.7/site-packages/matplotlib/pyplot.py", line 98, in <module>
_backend_mod, new_figure_manager, draw_if_interactive, _show = pylab_setup()
File "/sw/lib/python2.7/site-packages/matplotlib/backends/init.py", line 28, in pylab_setup
globals(),locals(),[backend_name],0)
File "/sw/lib/python2.7/site-packages/matplotlib/backends/backend_qt4agg.py", line 13, in <module>
from backend_qt4 import QtCore, QtGui, FigureManagerQT, FigureCanvasQT,\ File "/sw/lib/python2.7/site-packages/matplotlib/backends/backend_qt4.py", line 25, in <module>
from qt4_compat import QtCore, QtGui, _getSaveFileName, version
File "/sw/lib/python2.7/site-packages/matplotlib/backends/qt4_compat.py", line 80, in <module>
from PySide import QtCore, QtGui, version, version_info
ImportError: No module named PySide

Is there any simple workaround to this? I need necessarily to use fink as some of my packages are currently available and properly linked only through this latter (i.e. PyDSTool). But Spyder is really a very useful and practical interface to work in python. And it is quite a pity that the fink version right now produces this problem making it unusable.

Thanks in advance for your help.

Maurizio

[Hanspeter Niederstrasser]

Assigning to spyder maintainer.

Although this is probably not the cause of your spyder failure, having mismatched xcode and command-line-tools is generally not a good idea and has been known to cause failures when building many other packages.

David: latest upstream is 2.2.5.

[Maurizio De Pitta']

I agree. However, the last version of Xcode CLTs has some incompatibilities with some packages and on google it was recommended to stick back on 5.0.2 till such issues will be solved.

[Alexander Hansen]

Maybe try rolling your Xcode.app back to 5.0.2, then.

[Maurizio De Pitta']

Well, ok, I can. But the issue that I posted here is unrelated to Xcode, since I used in a previous installation Xcode 5.0.2 only and the same issue persisted.

[Hanspeter Niederstrasser]

The ICCP warnings are most likely due to libpng16 not liking some PNG file inside the spyder application. libpng16 is stricter about the PNG file format than earlier versions. Regardless, they are warnings and harmless.

For the actual runtime error, the python script /sw/bin/spyder-mac-py27.py does not set PYTHONPATH to find the location of the PyQT module and fails, but can be made to work by setting PYTHONPATH manually). The shell script /sw/bin/spyder-mac-py27 does set it (and then runs /sw/bin/spyder-mac-py27.py)and is what I could find to start up the spyder graphical application. Is there a shell only command for spyder? If so, how do I run it?

[Maurizio De Pitta']

Hi Hans,
I am afraid I cannot really help on this as I am a newbie to spyder (and unix/linux/osx in general). I would be prone to say no, as spyder is meant to be a graphical interface for pyhton, but when I run it, I used always the script that you mention.

Indeed once opening this script, I read:

export PYTHONPATH=/sw/lib/qt4-mac/lib/python2.7/site-packages
/sw/bin/spyder-mac-py27.py

so there is actually a setting for the PYTHONPATH, which seems to be the effective location of the PyQT module. It seems rather that the problem is that PySide is missing. However this package shall come with PyQT shan't it? And I cannot find it on the fink repository...

But may be the problem is something else?

[Hanspeter Niederstrasser]

If spyder is a graphical interface and there's no stand alone shell component for it, then /sw/bin/spyder-mac-py27 seems like it has the correct incantations that are needed to start it and there's no bug there. As for PySide, that's an alternate binding between python and Qt4 (vs PyQt), and spyder seems to be able to use either one (as far as I can tell). PySide is not currently present in the Fink repository. But for spyder, PyQt should suffice (it worked on the two machines I tested).

Does running /sw/bin/spyder-mac-py27 not work for you at all?

[Maurizio De Pitta']

Hi Hans,
no it does not. The command launches spyder, but then it gives all those problems with the PySide that makes the overall package unusable (it cannot in fact run matplotlib correctly, and the IPython version issue + PySide, make the system freeze or generate errors of various kind as soon as I start playing with python.

I don't understand how you could make it work on your system. I tend to assume that you linked it to some previous version of IPython? Could it be?

Eventually, what would you advice to do? I donwloaded all python and everything else from fink, and for the rest everything works nicely.

M