Solution to the "error: externally-managed-environment" error in Python.
From Ubuntu 23.04 you may encounter a new error in Python due to a change in the package installation policy that prevents packages installed through pip from colliding in any way with those installed with APT.
The error in question is:
error: externally-managed-environment
Solution
To prevent problems with packages from the operating system and Python, it is recommended to use a virtual environment with venv. The first thing you should do is to create a virtual environment. For this, we will install venv.
sudo apt install python3-venvAfter this, you must create a virtual environment. You can create as many as you want. The following command uses venv to create the environment in the ".venv" folder where the command was executed.
python3 -m venv .venvIt is recommended to create the virtual environment within each project. This is because each Python project may have different package requirements and Python versions. If you take a look at the created folder, you will see the following:
user@server# ls .venv/
bin include lib lib64 pyvenv.cfgWhat you see is a virtual environment with a copy of python and pip. Everything you install after activating that environment will be within that virtual environment. Finally, to activate the created environment, you can use the following command:
source .venv/bin/activate
As an example, if you want to install openai after having activated the environment, you can execute pip as follows:
pip install openai