#740 ImportError: No system module 'pywintypes' (pywintypes36.dll)

[kuno]

I downloaded and "pip install"-ed pywin32 from http://www.lfd.uci.edu/~gohlke/pythonlibs/f9r7rmd8/pywin32-220.1-cp36-cp36m-win32.whl, as PyPI does not seem to serve a precompiled version compatible with Python 3.6.

Now, I am facing the following import error:

>>> import pywintypes
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>
  File "C:\Users\mek\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python36-32\lib\site-packages\win32\lib\pywintypes.py", line 124, in <module>
    __import_pywin32_system_module__("pywintypes", globals())
  File "C:\Users\mek\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python36-32\lib\site-packages\win32\lib\pywintypes.py", line 98, in __import_pywin32_system_module__
    raise ImportError("No system module '%s' (%s)" % (modname, filename))
ImportError: No system module 'pywintypes' (pywintypes36.dll)

In fact, as Process Monitor shows, the corresponding storage location "C:\Users\mek\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python36-32\Lib\site-packages\pywin32_system32\" is not even scanned by python.exe. Instead, many search paths ending with "/<stdin>" show up.

[... (a lot of entries from %PATH%) ...]
12:37:26.9899610    python.exe  7368    CreateFile  C:\Users\mek\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python36-32\pywintypes36.dll NAME NOT FOUND  Desired Access: Read Attributes, Synchronize, Disposition: Open, Options: Synchronous IO Non-Alert, Open Reparse Point, Attributes: N, ShareMode: None, AllocationSize: n/a
12:37:26.9900549    python.exe  7368    CreateFile  C:\Users\mek\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python36-32\Lib\site-packages\win32\lib\pywintypes36.dll NAME NOT FOUND  Desired Access: Read Attributes, Synchronize, Disposition: Open, Options: Synchronous IO Non-Alert, Open Reparse Point, Attributes: N, ShareMode: None, AllocationSize: n/a
12:37:26.9905114    python.exe  7368    CreateFile  C:\<stdin>  NAME INVALID    Desired Access: Generic Read, Disposition: Open, Options: Synchronous IO Non-Alert, Non-Directory File, Attributes: N, ShareMode: Read, Write, AllocationSize: n/a
12:37:26.9906117    python.exe  7368    CreateFile  C:\<stdin>  NAME INVALID    Desired Access: Generic Read, Disposition: Open, Options: Synchronous IO Non-Alert, Non-Directory File, Attributes: N, ShareMode: Read, Write, AllocationSize: n/a
12:37:26.9906786    python.exe  7368    CreateFile  C:\Users\mek\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python36-32\python36.zip\<stdin> PATH NOT FOUND  Desired Access: Generic Read, Disposition: Open, Options: Synchronous IO Non-Alert, Non-Directory File, Attributes: N, ShareMode: Read, Write, AllocationSize: n/a
12:37:26.9907763    python.exe  7368    CreateFile  C:\Users\mek\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python36-32\DLLs\<stdin> NAME INVALID    Desired Access: Generic Read, Disposition: Open, Options: Synchronous IO Non-Alert, Non-Directory File, Attributes: N, ShareMode: Read, Write, AllocationSize: n/a
12:37:26.9909128    python.exe  7368    CreateFile  C:\Users\mek\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python36-32\Lib\<stdin>  NAME INVALID    Desired Access: Generic Read, Disposition: Open, Options: Synchronous IO Non-Alert, Non-Directory File, Attributes: N, ShareMode: Read, Write, AllocationSize: n/a
12:37:26.9909895    python.exe  7368    CreateFile  C:\Users\mek\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python36-32\<stdin>  NAME INVALID    Desired Access: Generic Read, Disposition: Open, Options: Synchronous IO Non-Alert, Non-Directory File, Attributes: N, ShareMode: Read, Write, AllocationSize: n/a
12:37:26.9910751    python.exe  7368    CreateFile  C:\Users\mek\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python36-32\Lib\site-packages\<stdin>    NAME INVALID    Desired Access: Generic Read, Disposition: Open, Options: Synchronous IO Non-Alert, Non-Directory File, Attributes: N, ShareMode: Read, Write, AllocationSize: n/a
12:37:26.9911617    python.exe  7368    CreateFile  C:\Users\mek\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python36-32\Lib\site-packages\win32\<stdin>  NAME INVALID    Desired Access: Generic Read, Disposition: Open, Options: Synchronous IO Non-Alert, Non-Directory File, Attributes: N, ShareMode: Read, Write, AllocationSize: n/a
12:37:26.9912590    python.exe  7368    CreateFile  C:\Users\mek\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python36-32\Lib\site-packages\win32\lib\<stdin>  NAME INVALID    Desired Access: Generic Read, Disposition: Open, Options: Synchronous IO Non-Alert, Non-Directory File, Attributes: N, ShareMode: Read, Write, AllocationSize: n/a
12:37:26.9913468    python.exe  7368    CreateFile  C:\Users\mek\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python36-32\Lib\site-packages\pythonwin\<stdin>  NAME INVALID    Desired Access: Generic Read, Disposition: Open, Options: Synchronous IO Non-Alert, Non-Directory File, Attributes: N, ShareMode: Read, Write, AllocationSize: n/a

[kuno]

When looking at the PyPI-counterpart of https://github.com/pywin32/pypiwin32/blob/master/pywin32.pth, the following two lines are missing:

import os;os.environ["PATH"]+=(';'+os.path.join(sitedir,"pywin32_system32"))

This looks quite hacky to me (Python code in a text file, references to a non-declared sitedir variable), but this get things working.

(The background is that _win32sysloader.LoadModule(filename) actually uses LoadLibrary() under the hood. I have no idea about the origin of the <stdin> postfixes, though.)

[Xaav]

I'm working with the pypiwin32 group to have a compiled version up soon. I don't think it will be too long.

[kuno]

[#721] is also somewhat related to this bug.