Colaboratory: how to install PyGame Learning Environment

Question

In Colaboratory, we are forced to use pip install. Some third packages such as gym, PLE, etc, their installation should be

git clone https://github.com/ntasfi/PyGame-Learning-Environment.git
cd PyGame-Learning-Environment/
pip install -e .

When I tried, here are some problems:

1) !cd doesn't work here. I'm still in my current folder in google drive.

2) Instead, I directly run:

!git clone https://github.com/ntasfi/PyGame-Learning-Environment.git 
!pip install -e PyGame-Learning-Environment 

And it says successfully installed, but I cannot import it. I checked and it doesnt appear in the /usr/local/lib/python3.6/dist-packages

I also checked the python by:

import os
print(os.getcwd())

which gives me: /content, a directory I dont understand. And obviously I cannot import the package.

What should I do?

Answer 1

Here's a worked example: https://colab.research.google.com/drive/1PsPArPkxnhCIKSFK2gDA46_vnLMc1U9z

Tips:

• Use os.chdir instead of !cd. ! commands execute in a subshell, so their effects won't apply to subsequent commands. os.chdir will, however.
• You want to check sys.path instead of site-packages since you're installing with -e.
• You'll also need to install pygame. It looks like that's an unlisted dep.

Full install recipe:

import os
!git clone https://github.com/ntasfi/PyGame-Learning-Environment.git
os.chdir('PyGame-Learning-Environment')
!pip install -e .
!pip install pygame
os.chdir('/content')