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Author Dimitri Merejkowsky
Recipients Christopher Brousseau, Dimitri Merejkowsky, paul.moore, steve.dower, tim.golden, zach.ware
Date 2021-03-25.18:11:33
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Message-id <1616695893.94.0.289460938663.issue37745@roundup.psfhosted.org>
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I know this is two years later so maybe this is not the best way to get answers, but Steve Dower said:

> We don't add Python to PATH by default (because it's bad), and people couldn't find the option

Could someone clarify this for me? Because my experience as a Python teacher tells me the exact opposite.

For context, I've been teaching Python to absolute beginners (some of them do not even know how to *use* Windows to begin with).

I do tell them repeatedly to make sure to tick the "add python to Path", but every time, one of them forgot.

This gets even worse when the course is done remotely because I have to *tell* the students what to do through a screen-sharing app ...

Here's what I had to tell one of the students to do this morning.

Step 1: Tick "Display Hidden Items" in the Display option of the Windows File Explorer

Step 2: Go into c:\users\AppData

Step 3: Type `python.exe` in the search bar

Step 4: Copy/paste the full path 

Step 5: Open "Edit environment variables for my account"

Step 6: Click on "Edit environment variables"

Step 7: Click on Path

Step 8: Copy/paste the full path, without "python.exe"

Step 9: Copy/paste the full path, adding `\Scripts\` at the end

Step 10: restart cmd.exe


In insight, I wonder if I should have just told him to just re-run the installer and tick the box ...

Some notes: 

Fixing #14302 would help for step 9, which is nice.

I know very well that writing a Windows installer is far for trivial, but I'm ready to try and make a PR anyway. That being said, I understand there may be good reasons to *not* add python to PATH that I don't know about.
History
Date User Action Args
2021-03-25 18:11:33Dimitri Merejkowskysetrecipients: + Dimitri Merejkowsky, paul.moore, tim.golden, zach.ware, steve.dower, Christopher Brousseau
2021-03-25 18:11:33Dimitri Merejkowskysetmessageid: <1616695893.94.0.289460938663.issue37745@roundup.psfhosted.org>
2021-03-25 18:11:33Dimitri Merejkowskylinkissue37745 messages
2021-03-25 18:11:33Dimitri Merejkowskycreate