Adding installation options

As seen in previous examples, basic use of this script is:

python setup.py install

But there is even more options, like installing the package and have the possibility to change the code and test it without having to re-install it. This is done using:

python setup.py develop

If you want to perform specific actions like compiling a Sphinx documentation or building fortran code, you can create your own option like this:

cmdclasses = dict()

class BuildSphinx(Command):

    """Build Sphinx documentation."""

    description = 'Build Sphinx documentation'
    user_options = []

    def initialize_options(self):
        pass

    def finalize_options(self):
        pass

    def run(self):
        import sphinx
        sphinx.build_main(['setup.py', '-b', 'html', './doc', './doc/_build/html'])
        sphinx.build_main(['setup.py', '-b', 'man', './doc', './doc/_build/man'])

cmdclasses['build_sphinx'] = BuildSphinx

setup(
...
cmdclass=cmdclasses,
)

initialize_options and finalize_options will be executed before and after the run function as their names suggests it.

After that, you will be able to call your option:

python setup.py build_sphinx