30-seconds-of-code/snippets/python/s/setup-python3-pip3-as-default.md

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title	shortTitle	type	language	tags	author	cover	excerpt	dateModified
Tip: Set up Python 3 and pip 3 as default	Python 3 and pip 3 setup	tip	python	setup	chalarangelo	avocado-slices	A very common problem when working with Python is having to remember the correct version. Luckily, there's an easy fix for that.	2021-06-12T19:30:41+03:00

One of the most common headaches when working with Python is having to remember to use Python 3.x instead of Python 2.x. Luckily, it's really easy to setup Python 3 and pip 3 as the defaults. You first need to figure out where each one is installed using the which command:

which python3   # /usr/local/bin/python3
which pip3      # /usr/local/bin/pip3

Make a note of each response, so that you can add the paths as aliases to your shell environment's configuration file. Then, you can use echo to add a line for each one to either .zshrc or .bashrc depending on your environment:

# Linux or other bash environment
echo "alias python=/usr/local/bin/python3" >> ~/.bashrc
echo "alias pip=/usr/local/bin/pip3" >> ~/.bashrc

# Mac OS or other zsh environment
echo "alias python=/usr/local/bin/python3" >> ~/.zshrc
echo "alias pip=/usr/local/bin/pip3" >> ~/.zshrc

And you're all done! python and pip are both mapped to their 3.x versions,