Py2Exe: "error: invalid command: py2exe"

Question

I can't figure out how to use py2exe, what am I doing wrong?

This is my my setup.py file witch is in the same folder as the rest of my project:

from distutils.core import setup
import py2exe

setup(console=['main.py'])

And then, as described on the homepage of py2exe, I navigate to the project directory with my python-files and type

python setup.py py2exe

But I only get this error!

E:\Programme(x86)\Python2.7x86\lib\distutils\dist.py:267: UserWarning: Unknown distribution option: 'console'
  warnings.warn(msg)
usage: setup.py [global_opts] cmd1 [cmd1_opts] [cmd2 [cmd2_opts] ...]
   or: setup.py --help [cmd1 cmd2 ...]
   or: setup.py --help-commands
   or: setup.py cmd --help

error: invalid command 'py2exe'

I've seen and read this post and lot's of others, but all seem to solve the problem by:

installing py2exe
navigating to the source path
typing in the correct command
correcting setup.py

All this (seems to me) is correct in my case. Maybe the solution is written in the error, but I can't interpret it usefully...

Other things I tried:

Use absolute paths
python setup.py py2exe install

I recognized that the problem occurs while importing py2exe, python doesn't execute anything after the second line.

Note: The PATH variable is correctly set, typing "python" and then "import py2exe" into the cmd works fine.

Thanks!

It very much looks like the py2exe module isn't available to the python interpreter that you're launching. Do you have more than one version of python installed? I can reproduce the error message you receive by commenting the import py2exe line in one of my setup scripts. — g.d.d.c
– g.d.d.c, Commented Apr 17, 2014 at 15:32
No, I don't think so... I've tried to start both the shell and the script with the absolute path, and I may import py2exe on the shell, the error above stays. — Nearoo
– Nearoo, Commented Apr 17, 2014 at 17:12
It's so weird! The function help("modules py2exe"), witch searches for modules with similar names like "py2exe", finds py2exe in the shell but returns None if executed in a file! Python.exe is the same, I've checked that with sys.executable. It's not the first time I installed an external library, all others worked. — Nearoo
– Nearoo, Commented Apr 17, 2014 at 17:20
That sounds to me like something is broken in either your python install, or your py2exe install. I'd half-consider scrapping that python interpreter, or maybe even just installing a separate copy of python to another directory somewhere, installing py2exe there, and testing with a separate interpreter. Maybe something in site.py is screwy? Where did you get your python install from? — g.d.d.c
– g.d.d.c, Commented Apr 17, 2014 at 17:23
Also, what are the names of some of your python modules? Did you name any of them py2exe or the like? Perhaps you're creating confusion for the interpreter because of something it's finding in your path that it shouldn't and preventing the actual py2exe module from being loaded? — g.d.d.c
– g.d.d.c, Commented Apr 17, 2014 at 17:25

Nearoo · Accepted Answer · 2014-04-18 12:40:39Z

1

With the help of g.d.d.c I found the problem.

There was a "py2exe.pyc" in the same directory witch confused the python-interpreter. Besides I did not know there was a file with this name, I also didn't know you can import and use them like modules...

If your problem stays, test if it works after re-installing Python.

answered Apr 18, 2014 at 12:40

Nearoo

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