[SOLVED] Recommended way to install pip(3) on centos7

Issue

I am interrested in knowing the recommended way to install pip3 for python3.6 (as of today, may 2018) on current version of centos7 (7.5.1804) and the accepted answer of href="https://stackoverflow.com/questions/32618686/how-to-install-pip-in-centos-7">How to install pip in CentOS 7? seems to be outdated because:

yum search -v pip

outputs (among other things):

python2-pip.noarch : A tool for installing and managing Python 2 packages
Repo        : epel

python34-pip.noarch : A tool for installing and managing Python3 packages
Repo        : epel

and python34-pip seems to be a (newer?) simpler way than the accepted answer of How to install pip in CentOS 7? :

sudo yum install python34-setuptools

sudo easy_install-3.4 pip

But since the versions of python installed on my machine are 2.7.5 and 3.6.3 why is it python34-pip and not python36-pip ? Is pip the same for 3.4+ (up to current 3.6.3) ?

Solution

1. Is pip the same for 3.4+

   No, it's not. A single pip installation serves a single Python distribution (pip2.7/pip3.4/pip3.5 etc).

2. Since Python 3.5, pip is already bundled with the python distribution, so you can just run python3.6 -m pip instead of pip.

3. Python 3.6 is not available in CentOS 7 vanilla repo. I usually resort to IUS repo when needing to install a fresh Python on CentOS. It always has the most recent Python version, the current one being 3.6.5. It also offers a correspondent pip package.

   $ yum install https://centos7.iuscommunity.org/ius-release.rpm
   $ yum install python36u python36u-devel python36u-pip
   

   Unfortunately, IUS doesn't offer a package for Python 3.7 yet so if you are looking for Python 3.7 on CentOS 7, building from source is your only option.

Edit: when yum is not an option

You should prefer the bootstrapping solution described in this answer as it is the most reliable way to get a working pip installed.

Answered By - hoefling

Answer Checked By - David Marino (WPSolving Volunteer)