Why can't absolute imports find my module?

Question

I have a Python 2.7 project that looks like this:

myproject\

- __init__.py
- __main__.py
- foo.py

I'd like to use absolute imports, as required by PEP 8, but when I try to do this in __main__.py:

from myproject.foo import bar

With python -m myproject

I get:

ImportError: No module named myproject.foo

What am I doing wrong?

What did you do to specifically cause that exception? `python -m myproject`? If so please edit your question with that information — Ian Stapleton Cordasco, Sep 30 '13 at 13:21

score 2 · Accepted Answer · edited May 23 '17 at 12:02

2

After a bit more Googling it turns out, all I needed to do was add:

from __future__ import absolute_import

This adds some future-proofing for Python 3.Note that PyDev cannot find the modules this way. I'll open a separate question for that.

edited May 23 '17 at 12:02

Community

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answered Sep 30 '13 at 14:03

Sean W.

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Might want to mention in your question that you're using Python 2.x (and tag it as such, too, for relevance) – Wayne Werner Sep 30 '13 at 14:42

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Sep 30 '13 at 13:14

1

For that to work, myproject has to be on your Python path. You can do that externally by setting the PYTHONPATH variable, or inside the program by adding it to sys.path.

(Note that there's no convention to use double-underscore names on anything other than __init__.py. Your __main__.py seems a very odd name.)

answered Sep 30 '13 at 13:14

Daniel Roseman

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`__main__`is understood by pythonwhen you `python -m` a package. – SingleNegationElimination Sep 30 '13 at 13:17
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I used `__main__.py` because Python [looks for it](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/4042905/what-is-main-py) when `python myproject` in run. – Sean W. Sep 30 '13 at 13:23
Cool, for some reason I'd never come across that before. – Daniel Roseman Sep 30 '13 at 13:24
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`__main__.py` also allows you to zip up your project to `myproject.zip` (or whatever) and run `python myproject`, @DanielRoseman – Wayne Werner Sep 30 '13 at 14:42

Why can't absolute imports find my module?

2 Answers2