Previous: Installation Up: Installation Next: Windows

Python (Required)

ReadMe requires an interpreter for the Python programming language. Python is free and open-source software and is available for Windows, Mac OS X, Linux and many other common platforms.

If Python is not installed on your computer, you can download source or executable packages for free at http://www.python.org/download/. Standard installations for Windows, Mac or Linux should require no further configuration for use with ReadMe.

If you receive a message indicating that Python is not on your system path, check that the interpreter is installed and the directory in which it is installed is on your system path. If Python is installed with the default options on Windows, it is usually unnecessary to change your system path. Default installations for other operating systems normally place Python in a directory already on your system path. Please see the excellent documentation on the Python site for more information about installing and running the Python interpreter.

The system path is a list of directories in which the operating system will search for a given program when you type its name. In both Windows and Unix, it is defined in an environment variable generally called PATH. In Unix, the path is specified in the appropriate configuration file for your login shell. In recent versions of Windows, you may change your system path by right clicking on the ``My Computer'' icon on your desktop, clicking properties, clicking the ``Advanced'' tab and, within ``Advanced,'' clicking the Environment Variables button. Find the path variable and click ``edit.'' Notice that the path is a list of directories, separated by a semicolon. Add or delete directories as appropriate while adhering to this format.

If you do not wish to change your system path for any reason, you can specify the full path of the python binary using the pyexe argument to the undergrad function.

ReadMe has been tested with Python versions 2.3, 2.4 and 2.5 and should work with earlier versions as well. If you are running an earlier version of Python and experience any difficulty with the Python portion of the program, please upgrade to a more recent version.



Gary King 2011-03-02