3.2. pipx-based installation

To help you installing MUSE in your system we will follow these steps:

In the following sections, we will guide you step by step in configuring your system so it can run MUSE. At the end, we include alternative ways of installing MUSE if this method does not work for any reason and for advanced users.

Note

The next sections will explain in detail the appropriate steps as well as commenting on possible caveats. We strongly encourage you to read through the sections below to understand what these steps entitle, but in the end, what we are going to do to install MUSE is the following:

  • Open a terminal

  • Install pyenv (Linux and MacOS) or pyenv-win (Windows) and make sure it works.

  • Run the following commands in the terminal:

    pyenv install 3.9.13
pyenv shell 3.9.13
python -m pip install pipx
python -m pipx ensurepath
python -m pipx install muse-os

  • After this, MUSE will be available to use system wide simply by invoking muse in the terminal, for example muse --model default.

3.2.1. Launching a terminal

All operative systems have a Terminal application that let you run commands. You will need to use it extensively when using MUSE, so we strongly suggest you get familiar with it. For now, let’s just figure out how to launch it:

  • Linux: Depending on the distribution, you might have a shortcut in your tasks bar already or it should be easily found in the menu. Look for Console or Terminal to lunch the application.

  • MacOS: Press Super key + Space to open the search box. There, type Terminal and press Enter.

  • Windows: Windows comes with a couple of options. We will be using Windows PowerShell. Press the Windows key and start typing PowerShell. When the application shows up, click to on it.

Once you have launched the Terminal, the window that opens will show the command prompt, where we will input all the commands form now on. The following are a couple of examples of what it looks like, typically, but it might be a bit different in your system depending on how it is configured:

  • Linux and MacOS Terminal:

your_user_name@computer_name:~$

  • Windows PowerShell:

PS C:\Users\your_user_name>

Note

For simplicity, we will be excluding the command prompt in the following sections whenever we indicate that a command should be executed in the terminal.

3.2.2. Installing a compatible Python version

MUSE needs Python to run but, for now, it only works with versions 3.8 and 3.9, so the next step is to install a suitable version of Python.

Note

Windows users should disable the alias for Python that comes by default with Windows and that will try to install Python from the Microsoft Store every time we write python in the terminal. To do so, press the Windows key and start typing alias, when it shows up, click in Manage app execution aliases. In the window that opens, disable all the entries related to Python, like in the image.

Screen to disable the Python aliases defined by Windows.

Note

If you already have a Python version installed from the Microsoft Store, you might have a py command that will launch Python in the terminal. That Python Launcher will use a Microsoft Stored-installed version of Python. Unless any of those versions, under the control of Microsoft and their autoupdating schedule, happen to be compatible with MUSE, we advise against using the launcher and follow the instructions below, which will give you more control on what is exactly being run and how MUSE is being installed.

The first thing will be to check if you already have a suitable python version installed. Open a terminal and run:

python --version

If the output is Python 3.8.X or Python 3.9.X, where X is any number, then you have a version of Python compatible with MUSE and you can skip this section altogether. Move to Installing pipx. In any other case, keep reading.

There are multiple ways of installing Python, as well as multiple distributions. Here we have opted for the one that we believe is simplest, requires the smallest downloads and gives the maximum flexibility: using pyenv.

Note

If you have Anaconda Python installed, then you can use it instead of pyenv to create an environment with a suitable Python version. Go to section Creating a conda virtual environment and jump to Installing pipx when it is completed.

3.2.2.1. Installing pyenv

pyenv (pyenv-win for Windows) is a tool that lets you install and manage different python versions. It is small, unobtrusive and self-contained, and it is available for the three operative systems. However, you might want to consider a more fully fledged Python distribution like Anaconda, specially if your work involved non-python packages or a lot of data science and machine learning tools. If that is the case, go to the Virtual environment-based installation section.

To install pyenv, follow these steps:

  • Linux: In this case, you will need to clone the GitHub repository using git. Most Linux distributions come with git installed, so this should work out of the box:

    git clone https://github.com/pyenv/pyenv.git ~/.pyenv

    Then, complete the setup by adding pyenv to your profile, so the executable can be found. Check the instructions in the official webpage.

  • MacOS: The simplest option is to use Homebrew:

    brew update
brew install pyenv

    Then, complete the setup by adding pyenv to your profile, so the executable can be found. Check the instructions in the official webpage.

  • Windows: pyenv-win is a separate project but it has the same functionality and it is also simpler to setup. Just run the following command and you should be ready to go:

    Invoke-WebRequest -UseBasicParsing -Uri "https://raw.githubusercontent.com/pyenv-win/pyenv-win/master/pyenv-win/install-pyenv-win.ps1" -OutFile "./install-pyenv-win.ps1"; &"./install-pyenv-win.ps1"

    Note

    If you are getting any UnauthorizedAccess error, then start Windows PowerShell with the “Run as administrator” option (see figure above) and run:

    Set-ExecutionPolicy -ExecutionPolicy RemoteSigned -Scope LocalMachine

    Finally open a normal PowerShell and re-run the above installation command.

After completing the above steps, you will need to close the terminal and re-open it again. After that, to check if things work run:

pyenv --version

You should get something similar to:

pyenv 3.1.1

3.2.2.2. Actually installing Python

With pyenv installed and correctly configured, it is now easy to install any Python version we want. To see the versions available run:

pyenv install -l

You should see a very long list of versions to choose from. Let’s install the latest version of the 3.9 family:

pyenv install 3.9.13

The command will take a minute or two to complete, depending on your internet connection, and show an output similar to the following (this is just an example for Windows):

:: [Info] ::  Mirror: https://www.python.org/ftp/python
:: [Downloading] ::  3.9.13 ...
:: [Downloading] ::  From https://www.python.org/ftp/python/3.9.13/python-3.9.13-amd64.exe
:: [Downloading] ::  To   C:\Users\your_username\.pyenv\pyenv-win\install_cache\python-3.9.13-amd64.exe
:: [Installing] ::  3.9.13 ...
:: [Info] :: completed! 3.9.13

Now, we have a new Python version in our system, but it is still not available (if you run python --version you will get the same result as before). There are two options moving forward:

  • If you want to set it as the global python version, available system wide (only do this if you really want to set is as your main Python!) run:

    pyenv global 3.9.13

  • If you just want it momentarily to install MUSE run instead the following command:

    pyenv shell 3.9.13

In both cases, if you run python --version afterwards, you should get Python 3.9.13.

3.2.3. Installing pipx

Next we need to install pipx, a Python application manager that facilitates installing, keeping applications updated and run them in their own isolated environments. We could skip this step and install MUSE directly, but that will risk to have conflicting dependencies in the future if you install any other application, breaking your MUSE installation, and we do not want that to happen.

The installation instructions for pipx can be found in the official webpage specific for the three operative systems. The following instructions, however, should work for the three cases:

python -m pip install pipx
python -m pipx ensurepath

Make sure you run these commands with a compatible Python version, as described in the previous section. If for whatever reason, this does not work, follow the system specific instructions in the webpage.

3.2.4. Installing MUSE itself

With all the system prepared, installing MUSE is the easiest part:

python -m pipx install muse-os

As above, make sure you run this command with the appropriate Python version.

And that is all! Now, MUSE should be available system wide simply by running muse in the terminal. For example, open a new terminal and run:

muse --model default

This will run a default, example model, completing after reaching year 2050. The following are the last few lines of the simulation:

...
-- 2023-08-02 09:11:50 - muse.sectors.sector - INFO
Running gas for year 2050

-- 2023-08-02 09:11:50 - muse.interactions - INFO
Net new_to_retro of 1 interactions interacting via transfer

-- 2023-08-02 09:11:50 - muse.hooks - INFO
Computing initial_asset_transform: default

-- 2023-08-02 09:11:50 - muse.hooks - INFO
Computing initial_asset_transform: clean

-- 2023-08-02 09:11:50 - muse.demand_share - INFO
Computing demand_share: default

-- 2023-08-02 09:11:51 - muse.production - INFO
Computing production: max

-- 2023-08-02 09:11:51 - muse.production - INFO
Computing production: max

-- 2023-08-02 09:11:51 - muse.production - INFO
Computing production: share

-- 2023-08-02 09:11:51 - muse.mca - INFO
Finish simulation year 2050!