How to use MySQLdb with Python and Django in OSX 10.6?

Question

This is a much discussed issue for OSX 10.6 users, but I haven't been able to find a solution that works. Here's my setup:

Python 2.6.1 64bit Django 1.2.1 MySQL 5.1.47 osx10.6 64bit

I create a virtualenvwrapper with --no-site-packages, then installed Django. When I activate the virtualenv and run python manage.py syncdb, I get this error:

Traceback (most recent call last):
File "manage.py", line 11, in <module>
  execute_manager(settings)
File "/Users/joerobinson/.virtualenvs/dj_tut/lib/python2.6/site-packages/django/core/management/__init__.py", line 438, in execute_manager
  utility.execute()
File "/Users/joerobinson/.virtualenvs/dj_tut/lib/python2.6/site-packages/django/core/management/__init__.py", line 379, in execute
  self.fetch_command(subcommand).run_from_argv(self.argv)
File "/Users/joerobinson/.virtualenvs/dj_tut/lib/python2.6/site-packages/django/core/management/__init__.py", line 257, in fetch_command
  klass = load_command_class(app_name, subcommand)
File "/Users/joerobinson/.virtualenvs/dj_tut/lib/python2.6/site-packages/django/core/management/__init__.py", line 67, in load_command_class
  module = import_module('%s.management.commands.%s' % (app_name, name))
File "/Users/joerobinson/.virtualenvs/dj_tut/lib/python2.6/site-packages/django/utils/importlib.py", line 35, in import_module
  __import__(name)
File "/Users/joerobinson/.virtualenvs/dj_tut/lib/python2.6/site-packages/django/core/management/commands/syncdb.py", line 7, in <module>
from django.core.management.sql import custom_sql_for_model, emit_post_sync_signal
File "/Users/joerobinson/.virtualenvs/dj_tut/lib/python2.6/site-packages/django/core/management/sql.py", line 5, in <module>
from django.contrib.contenttypes import generic
File "/Users/joerobinson/.virtualenvs/dj_tut/lib/python2.6/site-packages/django/contrib/contenttypes/generic.py", line 6, in <module>
  from django.db import connection
File "/Users/joerobinson/.virtualenvs/dj_tut/lib/python2.6/site-packages/django/db/__init__.py", line 75, in <module>
  connection = connections[DEFAULT_DB_ALIAS]
File "/Users/joerobinson/.virtualenvs/dj_tut/lib/python2.6/site-packages/django/db/utils.py", line 91, in __getitem__
  backend = load_backend(db['ENGINE'])
File "/Users/joerobinson/.virtualenvs/dj_tut/lib/python2.6/site-packages/django/db/utils.py", line 32, in load_backend
  return import_module('.base', backend_name)
File "/Users/joerobinson/.virtualenvs/dj_tut/lib/python2.6/site-packages/django/utils/importlib.py", line 35, in import_module
  __import__(name)
File "/Users/joerobinson/.virtualenvs/dj_tut/lib/python2.6/site-packages/django/db/backends/mysql/base.py", line 14, in <module>
  raise ImproperlyConfigured("Error loading MySQLdb module: %s" % e)
django.core.exceptions.ImproperlyConfigured: Error loading MySQLdb module: No module named MySQLdb

I've also installed the MySQL for Python adapter, but to no avail (maybe I installed it improperly?).

Anyone dealt with this before?

Answer 1

I had the same error and pip install MySQL-python solved it for me.

Alternate installs:

• If you don't have pip, easy_install MySQL-python should work.
• If your python is managed by a packaging system, you might have to use that system (e.g. sudo apt-get install ...)

Below, Soli notes that if you receive the following error:

EnvironmentError: mysql_config not found

... then you have a further system dependency issue. Solving this will vary from system to system, but for Debian-derived systems:

sudo apt-get install python-mysqldb