This walks through how to install PyBlosxom. This documentation is available as an INSTALL file in the git repository, with the source tarball and also available on the website in the documentation section.
If you see discrepancies between this document and the one on the website, assume the website is more recent!
If the instructions here don’t meet your needs, ask us on the pyblosxom-users mailing list or on IRC. Information for both is on the website.
If you’re upgrading from a previous version, make sure to read this file, UPGRADE and CHANGELOG.
PyBlosxom requires at least Python 2.4 to install.
PyBlosxom does not work with Python 3 or higher.
PyBlosxom is well supported on GNU/Linux, works well on Mac OS X, and might work on Windows.
PyBlosxom works with any web-server as a CGI application, works as a WSGI application, and might work in other contexts.
First you need to pick a method of installation:
You can install PyBlosxom site-wide. If you do this then all users on your system will be able to use PyBlosxom. In order to do this, you must have an administrative account.
See Installing site-wide if this is what you want to do.
You can install PyBlosxom locally. This is done using virtualenv.
See Installing locally if this is what you want to do.
You can install PyBlosxom locally in a way that makes it easy to hack on and send patches upstream to us.
See Installing PyBlosxom to hack on it if this is what you want to do.
If you have an administrative account on your computer and you want to install PyBlosxom site-wide so that all users can use it, then this is the installation section for you!
This requires:
To install:
pip is an improved replacement for easy_install. If you have pip then do:
sudo pip install pyblosxom
If you don’t have pip but do have easy_install then do:
sudo easy_install pyblosxom
If you have neither pip nor easy_install, then you should probably install one or the other to make your life with Python easier.
That’s it! You can move on to Creating a blog now.
If you want to install PyBlosxom in a way that doesn’t affect your system and in a way that only you can use it (perhaps you don’t have an administrative account on your system), then this is the installation section for you!
This requires:
To install:
Create a virtual environment (an isolated Python environment that has its own installation directories) for PyBlosxom in a directory of your choosing (as denoted by <VIRTUAL-ENV-DIR>):
virtualenv <VIRTUAL-ENV-DIR>
This command creates a new directory called <VIRTUAL-ENV-DIR> (you can use any directory name you want) that contains its own Python package installation directories and a Python interpreter that uses those directories. This is the virtual environment that PyBlosxom will be installed into and will run in. If you decide to delete PyBlosxom at some point, you can just remove this virtual environment directory.
Activate the virtual environment in your current shell session:
source <VIRTUAL-ENV-DIR>/bin/activate
This command changes your current shell’s $PATH environment variable to point to the <VIRTUAL-ENV-DIR>/bin directory, so that commands such as python, pip and easy_install will use the virtual environment instead of your default Python environment. It will also change your shell prompt to indicate that the virtual environment is active.
If you exit your current shell session and start a new one the virtual environment will no longer be active. You have to activate the virtual environment for each new shell session before doing anything with PyBlosxom.
Additionally, if you’re running PyBlosxom from CGI or a cron job, you want to use the python interpreter located in the bin directory of your virtual environment–not the system one.
Finally, install PyBlosxom into the activated virtual environment. If you have pip installed, then do:
pip install pyblosxom
If you don’t have pip installed, but have easy_install, then do:
easy_install pyblosxom
That’s it! You can move on to Creating a blog now.
Installing PyBlosxom to hack on it is a little different since you:
This requires:
To install:
Create a virtual environment for PyBlosxom into a directory of your choosing as denoted by <VIRTUAL-ENV-DIR>:
virtualenv <VIRTUAL-ENV-DIR>
This is the virtual environment that PyBlosxom will run in. If you decide to delete PyBlosxom at some point, you can just remove this virtual environment directory.
Activate the virtual environment:
source <VIRTUAL-ENV-DIR>/bin/activate
Remember to activate the virtual environment every time you do something with PyBlosxom.
Additionally, if you’re running PyBlosxom from CGI or a cron job, you want to use the python interpreter located in the bin directory of your virtual environment–not the system one.
Using git, clone the PyBlosxom repository:
git clone git://gitorious.org/pyblosxom/pyblosxom.git pyblosxom
Change directories into the pyblosxom directory and run:
python setup.py develop
When you want to run PyBlosxom from your git clone in your virtual environment, you will:
Make sure the virtual environment is activated and if it isn’t do:
source <VIRTUAL-ENV-DIR>/bin/activate
Change directories into where you have your blog and do:
paster serve blog.ini
Because you installed PyBlosxom with python setup.py develop, when you make changes to the PyBlosxom code, they’ll be available in the environment–you don’t need to re-run python setup.py develop.
That’s it! You can move on to Creating a blog now.
To create a blog, do:
pyblosxom-cmd create ./blog/
That generates the directory structure, required files, and a first post in the ./blog/ directory.
Note
If you’re using a virtual environment, make sure you’ve activated the virtual environment and are using the pyblosxom-cmd in the bin directory of your virtual environment!
We use the word “deploy” to cover the steps and setup required to turn your blog into a website. This could be any of the following:
The PyBlosxom documentation covers some of these deployment options.
If you’re reading this as HTML, then see the Deploy chapters.
If you’re reading this on disk, then see the deploy* files in the docs/ directory.
If you want to deploy your blog in a way that’s not covered in the documentation, ask on the pyblosxom-users mailing list or on the #pyblosxom IRC channel on irc.freenode.net.
After you finish installing PyBlosxom, you should sign up on the pyblosxom-users mailing list.
Additionally, please hop on the #pyblosxom IRC channel on irc.freenode.net and say hi. It’ll almost certainly help you get acquainted with PyBlosxom and it’ll reduce the amount of time it takes to get your blog up and going.