To use buildout on Windows, you will need to install a few dependencies which other platforms manage on their own.
Here are the steps you need to follow (thanks to Hanno Schlichting for these):
Download and install Python 2.4.4 using the Windows installer from http://www.python.org/ftp/python/2.4.4/python-2.4.4.msi Select ‘Install for all users’ and it will put Python into the “C:Python24” folder by default.
You also want the pywin32 extensions available from http://downloads.sourceforge.net/pywin32/pywin32-210.win32-py2.4.exe?modtime=1159009237&big_mirror=0
If you develop Zope based applications you will usually only need Python 2.4 at the moment, so it’s easiest to put the Python binary on the systems PATH, so you don’t need to specify its location manually each time you call it.
Thus, put “C:Python24” and “C:Python24Scripts” onto the PATH. You can find the PATH definition in the control panel under system preferences on the advanced tab at the bottom. The button is called environment variables. You want to add it at the end of the already existing PATH in the system section. Paths are separated by a semicolons.
You can test if this was successful by opening a new shell (cmd) and type in ‘python -V’. It should report version 2.4.4 (or whichever version you installed).
Opening a new shell can be done quickly by using the key combination ‘Windows-r’ or if you are using Parallels on a Mac ‘Apple-r’. Type in ‘cmd’ into the popup box that opens up and hit enter.
- Download the nice installer from http://subversion.tigris.org/files/documents/15/35379/svn-1.4.2-setup.exe
- Run the installer. It defaults to installing into “C:Program FilesSubversion”.
- Now put the install locations bin subfolder (for example “C:Program FilesSubversionbin”) on your system PATH in the same way you put Python on it.
- Open a new shell again and type in: ‘svn –version’ it should report version 1.4.2 or newer.
This is a native port of the gcc compiler and its dependencies for Windows. There are other approaches enabling you to compile Python C extensions on Windows including Cygwin and using the official Microsoft C compiler, but this is a lightweight approach that uses only freely available tools. As it’s used by a lot of people chances are high it will work for you and there’s plenty of documentation out there to help you in troubleshooting problems.
- Download the MinGW installer from http://downloads.sourceforge.net/mingw/MinGW-5.1.3.exe?modtime=1168794334&big_mirror=1
- The installer will ask you which options you would like to install. Choose base and make here. It will install into “C:MinGW” by default. The install might take some time as it’s getting files from sourceforge.net and you might need to hit ‘retry’ a couple of times.
- Now put the install location’s bin subfolder (for example “C:MinGWbin”) on your system PATH in the same way you put Python on it.
- Test this again by typing in: ‘gcc –version’ on a newly opened shell and it should report version 3.4.2 or newer.
Some general information are available from http://www.mingw.org/MinGWiki/index.php/Python%20extensions for example but you don’t need to read them all.
Create a file called ‘distutils.cfg’ in “C:Python24Libdistutils”. Open it with a text editor (‘notepad distutils.cfg’) and fill in the following lines:
[build] compiler=mingw32
This will tell distutils to use MinGW as the default compiler, so you don’t need to specify it manually using “–compiler=mingw32” while calling a package’s setup.py with a command that involves building C extensions. This is extremely useful if the build command is written down in a buildout recipe where you cannot change the options without hacking the recipe itself. The z2c.recipe.zope2install used in ploneout is one such example.