setuptools catch 22

[Diez B. Roggisch]

Mac schrieb:
> We've got ActiveState Python 2.6 installed on a Windows XP box, and I
> pulled down the latest archgenxml package (2.2) in order to get it
> running under this installation of Python.  I unpacked the tarball for
> the package and tried running `python setup.py build' but got an
> ImportError exception: "no module named setuptools."  So back to
> Google, where I find http://pypi.python.org/pypi/setuptools, which
> says "[For Windows] install setuptools using the provided .exe
> installer."  I go down to the bottom of the page and I see that there
> is no .exe installer for Python 2.6.  All there is for that version of
> Python is setuptools-0.6c9-py2.6.egg.  I get the impression from the
> references to "Python Eggs" on the setuptools page that setuptools is
> a utility for installing Python Eggs.  So we're supposed to use a
> utility that isn't installed yet to install that utility?  Does anyone
> else understand how lame this is?  From where I stand, the story for
> installation of third-party packages in Python is a sad, confused
> mess, and the Achilles heel of a language of which in all other
> respects I think very highly.


googling "setuptools bootstrap" yields this as first link:

http://peak.telecommunity.com/dist/ez_setup.py

Download that, and run "python ez_setup.py". That's it.


Diez