How to add own index to pip running in virtualenv?

Question

• I have a virtualenv with pip inside.
• I have my own package index.
• I want to add this package to pip to avoid invoking pip install some_package -i my_index all the time
• I want to add this index only to this specific pip instance running in virtualenv.

In that case, which file should I modify and how?

Answer 1

I run into the same problem, and found that pip support this in current version de facto https://pip.pypa.io/en/latest/user_guide.html#config-file

Inside a virtualenv:

On Unix and Mac OS X the file is $VIRTUAL_ENV/pip.conf
On Windows the file is: %VIRTUAL_ENV%\pip.ini

Answer 2

I never tried using my own index, but after some research this article should cover what you want to do.

Basically you need to add the following to your ~/.pip/pip.conf (on Windows systems, located at %HOME%\pip\pip.ini):

[global]
index-url = http://my.pypi.index/comes/here

The problem is that you will have a global definition for all your projects and what you want is a definition for all your users in the specific project. From pip documentation you can alter the config file lookup by using the environment var PIP_CONFIG_FILE

You could edit the virtual-env-folder/bin/activate script to include this environment var, but the problem is that creating a new virtual environment would lose this change and would not be possible to automate. What you can do is creating the .pip/pip.conf file in the root of your project and creating a simple activate-virtual-env script also on the root of the project with the following:

pushd $(dirname $0)
export PIP_CONFIG_FILE="$(pwd)/.pip/pip.conf"
source "$(pwd)/virtual-env-folder/bin/activate"
popd

and instruct your users to source this file instead of virtual-env-folder/bin/activate