Why does easy install want access to my rootfs for a "develop" install?
Question: I'm looking at a python application server and I wanted to play around with
the code. I'm lead to believe passing "develop" to setup.py should leave
everything in place without installing anything. However when running so it is
attempting to creating directories in my rootfs.

    
    
    ./setup.py develop
    

Gives:

    
    
    running develop
    Checking .pth file support in /usr/local/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/
    error: can't create or remove files in install directory
    

I thought this might be something to do with package checking but surely
attempting to write stuff into the rootfs is wrong?


Answer: The `develop` command wants to add a `.pth` entry for your project so that it
can be imported as an egg. See the [Development mode
documentation](http://pythonhosted.org/setuptools/setuptools.html#development-
mode), as well as the [`develop` command
docs](http://pythonhosted.org/setuptools/setuptools.html#develop).

The default is to put that entry in site-packages. Set a different library
path with the `--install-dir` switch.

