Why does PDM not install into .venv?

[danielmoessner]

Why does the pdm package list not match pip list?

I run the following commands:

pdm venv remove in-project
pdm venv create
pdm install
eval $(pdm venv activate)
pip list

Now pip list looks like:

Package          Version
---------------- ---------
certifi          2022.12.7
distlib          0.3.6
filelock         3.10.7
pip              23.0.1
pipenv           2023.3.20
platformdirs     3.2.0
protobuf         4.21.12
pydotplus        2.0.2
Pygments         2.14.0
pyparsing        3.0.9
setuptools       67.6.1
virtualenv       20.21.0
virtualenv-clone 0.5.7
wheel            0.38.4

But pdm list looks like:

╭──────────────────────┬────────────┬─────────────────────────────────────────────╮
│ name                 │ version    │ location                                    │
├──────────────────────┼────────────┼─────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ pathspec             │ 0.11.1     │                                             │
│ typing_extensions    │ 4.5.0      │                                             │
│ environs             │ 9.5.0      │                                             │
│ gunicorn             │ 20.1.0     │                                             │
│ coverage             │ 7.2.2      │                                             │
│ cfgv                 │ 3.3.1      │                                             │
│ pytz                 │ 2023.3     │                                             │
│ types-pytz           │ 2023.3.0.0 │                                             │
│ pytest-asyncio       │ 0.21.0     │                                             │
│ nodeenv              │ 1.7.0      │                                             │
│ pydantic             │ 1.10.7     │                                             │
│ v2-backend           │ 0.0.0      │ -e /Users/userWhateva/Documents/two/backend │
│ marshmallow          │ 3.19.0     │                                             │
│ platformdirs         │ 3.2.0      │                                             │
│ pytest               │ 7.2.2      │                                             │
│ mypy-extensions      │ 1.0.0      │                                             │
│ h11                  │ 0.14.0     │                                             │
│ click                │ 8.1.3      │                                             │
│ iniconfig            │ 2.0.0      │                                             │
│ whitenoise           │ 6.4.0      │                                             │
│ isort                │ 5.12.0     │                                             │
│ sqlparse             │ 0.4.3      │                                             │
│ uvicorn              │ 0.21.1     │                                             │
│ distlib              │ 0.3.6      │                                             │
│ pluggy               │ 1.0.0      │                                             │
│ setuptools           │ 67.6.1     │                                             │
│ virtualenv           │ 20.22.0    │                                             │
│ PyYAML               │ 6.0        │                                             │
│ django-debug-toolbar │ 4.0.0      │                                             │
│ ruff                 │ 0.0.261    │                                             │
│ Django               │ 4.2        │                                             │
│ attrs                │ 22.2.0     │                                             │
│ python-dotenv        │ 1.0.0      │                                             │
│ pre-commit           │ 3.2.2      │                                             │
│ pytest-django        │ 4.5.2      │                                             │
│ mysqlclient          │ 2.1.1      │                                             │
│ identify             │ 2.5.22     │                                             │
│ filelock             │ 3.12.0     │                                             │
│ mypy                 │ 1.2.0      │                                             │
│ asgiref              │ 3.6.0      │                                             │
│ packaging            │ 23.0       │                                             │
│ black                │ 23.3.0     │                                             │
╰──────────────────────┴────────────┴─────────────────────────────────────────────╯

Why is there are difference? And I somehow can not find the venv in which pdm installs the packages. My .pdm-python references the the created venv.

[danielmoessner]

I guess I found the answer as pdm does not add a pip executable to .venv/bin the default system pip is used. Maybe somebody can confirm and then close this issue.

[adriangb]

I was also confused by this. I am not searching the docs for how to install a one off pip package and coming up a bit dry.

[pawamoy]

That would be python -m ensurepip I think.

[adriangb]

Yup you are right, thank you!

I feel like this deserves a section in the docs. As a Python user I'm used to "just having" pip and have never had to run that before. Again I get why PDM is doing what it's doing, but I bit more empathy for users and explanation when PDM deviates from the norm would go a long way.

[pawamoy]

Good idea! Would you like to submit a PR to add this in the docs? 🙂

[GabDug]

If you need pip in your venv, you can toggle the PDM config venv.with_pip = True globally to make sure pip is always present when PDM creates a new venv.