Installing Python with Anaconda
Anaconda, is the world’s most popular data science platform. But don’t let that scare you off, it’s not just for data scientists. It has become one of the go to sources for those who want to learn Python with an option that is easy to install and setup. Anaconda is available for Windows, MacOS, and Linux. When you install Anaconda the installation also includes multiple libraries, and packages to help you on your coding journey. One such package is the Jupyter Notebook which is discussed in a separate article.
There are three editions of Anaconda:
- Individual Edition
- Team edition
- Enterprise Edition
In this article we are going to discuss how to install the Individual Edition, which is Anaconda’s free Python distribution for solo Python practitioners, researchers and students working on their own.
With over 20 million users worldwide, what makes Anaconda so popular?
- It’s a free, open source Python distribution
- It’s available for several operating systems, including Windows, macOS and Linux
- When you download and install Anaconda you don’t just get Python you also get dozens of Python packages which may be relevant to your work as a developer such as (flask, pandas, numpy and more). See here for the list of packages available for various operating systems.
- Anaconda helps you create and manage virtual environments. A virtual environment is a container where you can install a specific version of Python and related packages without impacting your original Python installation.
- Anaconda installs several tools to help you write Python code such as Jupyter Notebook and Spyder
There are lots of other reasons to choose Anaconda but I think that covers the main points.
Installing Anaconda on Windows
- Download the Anaconda installer
- Double click the installer to launch
- Click Next
- Read the licensing terms and click ‘I Agree’
- Select an install for ‘Just Me’, unless of course you are installing it for all users of your computer in which case you will need Windows Administrator access
- Choose if you want to add Anaconda to your PATH environment variable. I recommend that you do check this option even though the Anaconda documentation recommends to that you do not. When you do check the box the text will turn red, don’t worry, and proceed to the next step.
- Choose whether to register Anaconda as your default version of Python. Unless you plan on running multiple versions of Python, accept the default values and leave this box checked.
- Click the Install button
- You have the option of installing PyCharm for Anaconda by clicking the link https://www.anaconda.com/pycharm. If you would like to proceed without installing PyCharm, click the Next button.
- When the installation has successfully completed you will see the ‘Thanks for installing Anaconda’ prompt
- For more information go to the Anaconda documentation for Windows installation
- Verify your installation by following steps in Verifying your installation section below.
Installation on macOS
- Download the graphical macOS installer
- Double click the downloaded file and click continue to start the installation
- Answer the prompts on the Introduction, Read Me, and License screens
- Click the Install button to install Anaconda in the recommended directory. Changing directory is not recommended
- Click the continue button
- You have the option of installing PyCharm for Anaconda by clicking the link https://www.anaconda.com/pycharm. If you would like to proceed without installing PyCharm, click the Continue button.
- When the installation has successfully completed the following screen appears:
- Verify your installation by following steps in Verifying your installation section below.
Verifying your installation
You can confirm that Anaconda has been installed, and working by opening up the Anaconda Navigator. The Anaconda Navigator is a graphical user interface that comes with your installation of Anaconda.
- Windows: Click Start, search or select Anaconda Navigator from the menu
- macOS: Click Launchpad, select Anaconda Navigator or use cmd+space to open Spotlight Search and type ‘Navigator’ to open the program.
Congratulation you now have Python and Anaconda installed on your computer, and ready to start writing Python programs. If you would like help on your Python coding journey check out the courses available at Moonshot Python Programming.
I hope you found this article helpful.
