All of the different Python Copies Installed

OS python scripts will use the default as the scripts look for /usr/bin/python not the one on the path.

If you want python at the command prompt to use 2.6 I would remove /Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/bin/ from the path.

To get the bare 2.7 python you will need to use the full path.

If virtualenv is not installed for 2.7 you need easy_install - which should be in /Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/bin /Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/bin/easy_install virtualenv(if that is not there you should add distribute or setuptools.)

To create a 2/7 vitualenv run /Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/bin/python virtualenv.py ENV then running ENV/bin/python gives you the 2.7 version - as would running the activate script to add the virtualenv python to the from of your path for the rest of the Terminal session.

Okay.

Answer to number 1 is yes.

The fink developers recommend NOT removing the OSX versions of Python, simply because they are not terribly large files and may be necessary for certain OSX functions and programs.

And I want to have an additional version of at least python2.7 installed by fink, because it's a port tree that's designed to create a UNIX-like directory structure, which will hopefully make PostgreSQL and python play nicely together.

As far as question number 2, I'm not sure. I think this would work, but leaving the original OSX versions installed avoids the issue.

Question 3: yes. - see answer to question 1.

Making the fink version the one that runs via the terminal is a matter of:

1. make sure the directory containing the fink python binary precedes the OSX (or GUI-installed one) in the PATH, which can be done in users .profile or .bash_profile (located in directory ~/, the user's root) by either invoking the fink init script, . /sw/bin/init.sh, OR making sure that export PATH=/sw/bin:$PATH is included in the file AFTER any other line that exports a PATH with one of the other python paths at the beginning. For example, export PATH=/usr/bin:$PATH or export PATH=/usr/local/bin:$PATH.

2. Unless we want to invoke the python cli like python2.7, we'll need to make a symbolic link in the /sw/bin directory that points "python" to "python2.7", which is done by using sudo ln -s *source* *link*, which in this case looks like:

   sudo ln -s /sw/bin/python2.7 /sw/bin/python

Not sure what the answer to question 4 is yet, but am seeing that any libraries that exist in /sw/bin are being called from there, as opposed to other installations. Good.

Got a copy of Learning UNIX for OS X Mountain Lion that looks quite promising.