How to install PyPy3 + virtual environment in 30 seconds

TL;DR:

Run this

wget -qO- https://techoverflow.net/scripts/pypy3-installer.sh | bash

then run vpypy every time you want to activate (you might need to restart). The script currently assumes you are running Linux x86_64 and have installed virtualenv (sudo apt install virtualenv or similar if you don’t have it installed)

Full description:

PyPy is an alternate Python implementation that can be used to speed up many workloads. However, installing it is a somewhat cumbersome process, especially if you don’t have too much experience with virtual environments and related concepts.

We provide a script that automatically downloads PyPy3, installs it to ~/.pypy3 and creates a virtual environment in ~/.pypy3-virtualenv. After that, it creates a shell alias vpypy that aliases to source ~/.pypy3-virtualenv/bin/activate and hence provides an easily memoizable way of activating the environment without requiring the user to memoize the directory.

Also, since both pypy3 itself and the virtual environment are installed in the user’s home directory, running this script does not require admin permissions.

After running the script using

wget -qO- https://techoverflow.net/scripts/pypy3-installer.sh | bash

you can activate the virtual environment using the vpypy alias that is automatically added to ~/.bashrc and ~/.zshrc. Restart your shell for the alias definition to load, then run vpypy:

uli@uli-laptop ~ % vpypy
(.pypy3-virtualenv) uli@uli-laptop ~ %

You can see that the prompt has changed. Now you can use pip (which will install packages locally to the PyPy3 virtualenv), python (which maps to pypy3) and other related executables. In order to run a script using PyPy, just run python myscript.py

Full source code:

#!/bin/bash
# TechOverflow's 30-second Pypy3 virtual environment generator
# This script is released under CC0 1.0 Universal
DIRECTORY=~/.pypy3
VENV_DIRECTORY=~/.pypy3-virtualenv
VERSION=pypy3.6-v7.3.0-linux64

# Download (or use existing) pypy3
if [ -d "$DIRECTORY" ]; then
    echo "Skipping PyPy download, already exists"
else
    echo "Downloading PyPy to $DIRECTORY"
    # Download & extract to DIRECTORY
    wget https://techoverflow.net/downloads/${VERSION}.tar.bz2 -O /tmp/${VERSION}.tar.bz2
    bash -c "cd /tmp && tar xjvf ${VERSION}.tar.bz2"
    mv /tmp/${VERSION} $DIRECTORY
    rm /tmp/${VERSION}.tar.bz2
fi

# Create virtualenv
if [ -d "$VENV_DIRECTORY" ]; then
    echo "Skipping to create pypy3 virtualenv, already exists"
else
    echo "Creating PyPy virtual environment in $VENV_DIRECTORY"
    virtualenv -p ${DIRECTORY}/bin/pypy3 ${VENV_DIRECTORY}
fi

# Create "vpypy" shortcut
set -x
vpypy
result="$?"
set +x
if [ "$result" -ne 127 ]; then
    echo "Skipping to create vpypy shortcut, already exists in current shell"
else
    echo "Creating bash/zsh shortcut 'vpypy'"
    if [ -f ~/.bashrc ]; then
        echo -e "\n# TechOverflow PyPy installer\nalias vpypy='source ${VENV_DIRECTORY}/bin/activate'\n" >> ~/.bashrc
    fi
    if [ -f ~/.zshrc ]; then
        echo -e "\n# TechOverflow PyPy installer\nalias vpypy='source ${VENV_DIRECTORY}/bin/activate'\n" >> ~/.zshrc
    fi
    # Activate shortcut in current shell (but do not automatically activate virtual environment)
    alias vpypy='source ${VENV_DIRECTORY}/bin/activate'
fi

echo -e "\n\nPyPy installation finished. Restart your shell, then run 'vpypy' to activate the virtual environment"