"ImportError: Cannot import name multiarray"

Question

New programmer here.

I'm trying to run a script in the Windows command prompt but I'm having issues importing the numpy package and I don't know what's going wrong/how to fix it. When I run the script in iPython, it works perfectly. However, when I'm running it in the command prompt, I get the following:

Traceback (most recent call last):
File "C:\Users\James\Anaconda3\lib\site-packages\numpy\core\__init__.py", 
line 16, in <module>
from . import multiarray
ImportError: cannot import name multiarray

During handling of the above exception, another exception occurred:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:\Users\James\Documents\Chemistry Year Three\Python 
programming\untitled1.py", line 12, in <module>
    import numpy
  File "C:\Users\James\Anaconda3\lib\site-packages\numpy\__init__.py", line 
    142, in <module>
    from . import add_newdocs
  File "C:\Users\James\Anaconda3\lib\site-packages\numpy\add_newdocs.py", 
line 13, in <module>
    from numpy.lib import add_newdoc
  File "C:\Users\James\Anaconda3\lib\site-packages\numpy\lib\__init__.py", 
line 8, in <module>
    from .type_check import *
  File "C:\Users\James\Anaconda3\lib\site-packages\numpy\lib\type_check.py", 
line 11, in <module>
    import numpy.core.numeric as _nx
  File "C:\Users\James\Anaconda3\lib\site-packages\numpy\core\__init__.py",     
line 26, in <module>
    raise ImportError(msg)
ImportError:
Importing the multiarray numpy extension module failed.  Most
likely you are trying to import a failed build of numpy.
If you're working with a numpy git repo, try `git clean -xdf` (removes all
files not under version control).  Otherwise reinstall numpy.

Original error was: cannot import name multiarray

I uninstalled numpy using

pip uninstall numpy

Although it worked, it gave me this:

Proceed (y/n)? y
  Successfully uninstalled numpy-1.13.3
Exception:
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "c:\users\james\anaconda3\lib\shutil.py", line 387, in _rmtree_unsafe
    os.unlink(fullname)
PermissionError: [WinError 5] Access is denied: 
'C:\\Users\\James\\AppData\\Local\\Temp\\pip-uninstall- 
_v4vz8dq\\users\\james\\anaconda3\\lib\\site- 
packages\\numpy\\core\\multiarray.cp36-win_amd64.pyd'

During handling of the above exception, another exception occurred:
    Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "c:\users\james\anaconda3\lib\site- 
    packages\pip\_internal\cli\base_command.py", line 143, in main
    status = self.run(options, args)


    File "c:\users\james\anaconda3\lib\site-packages\pip\_internal\commands\uninstall.py", line 78, in run
    uninstall_pathset.commit()
  File "c:\users\james\anaconda3\lib\site-packages\pip\_internal\req\req_uninstall.py", line 275, in commit
    self.save_dir.cleanup()
  File "c:\users\james\anaconda3\lib\site-packages\pip\_internal\utils\temp_dir.py", line 81, in cleanup
    rmtree(self.path)
  File "c:\users\james\anaconda3\lib\site-packages\pip\_vendor\retrying.py", line 49, in wrapped_f
    return Retrying(*dargs, **dkw).call(f, *args, **kw)
  File "c:\users\james\anaconda3\lib\site-packages\pip\_vendor\retrying.py", line 212, in call
    raise attempt.get()
  File "c:\users\james\anaconda3\lib\site-packages\pip\_vendor\retrying.py", line 247, in get
    six.reraise(self.value[0], self.value[1], self.value[2])
  File "c:\users\james\anaconda3\lib\site-packages\pip\_vendor\six.py", line 693, in reraise
    raise value
  File "c:\users\james\anaconda3\lib\site-packages\pip\_vendor\retrying.py", line 200, in call
    attempt = Attempt(fn(*args, **kwargs), attempt_number, False)
  File "c:\users\james\anaconda3\lib\site-packages\pip\_internal\utils\misc.py", line 111, in rmtree
    onerror=rmtree_errorhandler)
  File "c:\users\james\anaconda3\lib\shutil.py", line 494, in rmtree
    return _rmtree_unsafe(path, onerror)
  File "c:\users\james\anaconda3\lib\shutil.py", line 384, in _rmtree_unsafe
    _rmtree_unsafe(fullname, onerror)
  File "c:\users\james\anaconda3\lib\shutil.py", line 384, in _rmtree_unsafe
    _rmtree_unsafe(fullname, onerror)
  File "c:\users\james\anaconda3\lib\shutil.py", line 384, in _rmtree_unsafe
    _rmtree_unsafe(fullname, onerror)
  [Previous line repeated 3 more times]
  File "c:\users\james\anaconda3\lib\shutil.py", line 389, in _rmtree_unsafe
    onerror(os.unlink, fullname, sys.exc_info())
  File "c:\users\james\anaconda3\lib\site-packages\pip\_internal\utils\misc.py", line 123, in rmtree_errorhandler
    func(path)
PermissionError: [WinError 5] Access is denied: 'C:\\Users\\James\\AppData\\Local\\Temp\\pip-uninstall-_v4vz8dq\\users\\james\\anaconda3\\lib\\site-packages\\numpy\\core\\multiarray.cp36-win_amd64.pyd'

I checked after with pip show numpy that it was deleted - it was - and then reinstalled using: pip install numpy, however I am still having the same import problem. Does anyone know what's going on?

Answer 1

I had the same problem with python3.7 on Ubuntu 18.04 and the solution was:

sudo -H python3.7 -m pip uninstall numpy
sudo apt purge python3-numpy
sudo -H python3.7 -m pip install --upgrade pip
sudo -H python3.7 -m pip install numpy

Answer 2

Looks like the numpy installation is corrupted in some kind of way. I can see in the logs that you are using Anaconda, but when you use pip install on an environment that anaconda installed it can make a bit of a mess.

Try this:

pip uninstall numpy
conda install -c anaconda numpy