Installing PyGtk in virtualenv

Question

So I am trying to run a simple matplotlib example in my virtualenv (in the console). Here's the code:

import matplotlib
matplotlib.use('GTKAgg')
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
radius = [1.0, 2.0, 3.0, 4.0, 5.0, 6.0]
area = [3.14159, 12.56636, 28.27431, 50.26544, 78.53975, 113.09724]
plt.plot(radius, area)
plt.show()

However, when I run this I get:

ImportError: Gtk* backend requires pygtk to be installed.

And now the fun starts. I tried to pip install pygtk but it throws:

********************************************************************
* Building PyGTK using distutils is only supported on windows. *
* To build PyGTK in a supported way, read the INSTALL file.    *
********************************************************************
Complete output from command python setup.py egg_info:
********************************************************************

I have checked the INSTALL file and says to try ./configfure; make; make install. However. I am not quite sure how to do this within virtualenv. Where do I unpack the sources for pygtk in order to be installed within virtualenv.

Answer 1

The trick is to manually set the correct paths and then run configure inside the virtualenv. This is quite basic, but it worked for me.

Install python-config in the virtual env and link it to python2.7-config:

pip install config
ln -s /home/PATH/TO/VIRT/bin/python-config /home/PATH/TO/VIRT/bin/python2.7-config

Install cairo in the virtual env:

wget http://cairographics.org/releases/py2cairo-1.10.0.tar.bz2
tar -xf py2cairo-1.10.0.tar.bz2
cd py2cairo-1.10.0
./waf configure --prefix=/home/PATH/TO/VIRT/
./waf build
./waf install

Install PyGTK

wget http://pypi.python.org/packages/source/P/PyGTK/pygtk-2.24.0.tar.bz2
tar -xf pygtk-2.24.0.tar.bz2
cd pygtk-2.24.0
export PKG_CONFIG_PATH=/home/PATH/TO/VIRT/lib/pkgconfig
./configure --prefix=/home/PATH/TO/VIRT/
make 
make install

And that should do it. Just replace PATH/TO/VIRT/ with your own path. I'm sure someone could assist on adding the path to virtualenvwrapper?