error: command 'cl.exe' failed: No such file or directory

Question

I am currently trying to install PYODBC via pip but am getting an error. at this point, I am at a loss on what to do.
Here is what it looks like:

 C:\Users\c.ginther>pip install pyodbc
 Collecting pyodbc
   Using cached pyodbc-3.0.10.tar.gz
 Installing collected packages: pyodbc
   Running setup.py install for pyodbc ... error
     Complete output from command "c:\program files\python35\python.exe" -u -c "import setuptools, tokenize;__file__='C:\\Users\\CB9EB~1.GIN\\AppData\\Local\\Temp\\pip-build-mdyxyolm\\pyodbc\\setup.py';exec(compile(getattr(tokenize, 'open', open)(__file__).read().replace('\r\n', '\n'), __file__, 'exec'))" install --record C:\Users\CB9EB~1.GIN\AppData\Local\Temp\pip-ag94eyey-record\install-record.txt --single-version-externally-managed --compile:
     running install
     running build
     running build_ext
     building 'pyodbc' extension
     creating build
     creating build\temp.win-amd64-3.5
     creating build\temp.win-amd64-3.5\Release
     creating build\temp.win-amd64-3.5\Release\Users
     creating build\temp.win-amd64-3.5\Release\Users\CB9EB~1.GIN
     creating build\temp.win-amd64-3.5\Release\Users\CB9EB~1.GIN\AppData
     creating build\temp.win-amd64-3.5\Release\Users\CB9EB~1.GIN\AppData\Local
     creating build\temp.win-amd64-3.5\Release\Users\CB9EB~1.GIN\AppData\Local\Temp
     creating build\temp.win-amd64-3.5\Release\Users\CB9EB~1.GIN\AppData\Local\Temp\pip-build-mdyxyolm
     creating build\temp.win-amd64-3.5\Release\Users\CB9EB~1.GIN\AppData\Local\Temp\pip-build-mdyxyolm\pyodbc
     creating build\temp.win-amd64-3.5\Release\Users\CB9EB~1.GIN\AppData\Local\Temp\pip-build-mdyxyolm\pyodbc\src
     cl.exe /c /nologo /Ox /W3 /GL /DNDEBUG /MD -DPYODBC_VERSION=3.0.10 -DPYODBC_UNICODE_WIDTH=2 -I/Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Platforms/MacOSX.platform/Developer/SDKs/MacOSX10.8.sdk/usr/include "-Ic:\program files\python35\include" "-Ic:\program files\python35\include" /EHsc /TpC:\Users\CB9EB~1.GIN\AppData\Local\Temp\pip-build-mdyxyolm\pyodbc\src\buffer.cpp /Fobuild\temp.win-amd64-3.5\Release\Users\CB9EB~1.GIN\AppData\Local\Temp\pip-build-mdyxyolm\pyodbc\src\buffer.obj /Wall /wd4668 /wd4820 /wd4711 /wd4100 /wd4127 /wd4191
     error: command 'cl.exe' failed: No such file or directory

This package requires Visual C++ to be installed. Try using `easy_install` instead. It should do a binary install (if one is available). — user590028, Jun 27 '16 at 18:05

score 4 · Accepted Answer · edited May 23 '17 at 12:09

As user590028 mentioned in the comments python requires a C compiler to install packages like pyodbc. On Windows the most common compiler is Visual Studio C++, so check the list below taken from Microsoft Visual C++ Compiler for Python 3.4

Visual Studio 2008 for Python 2.7.

Visual Studio 2010 for Python 3.4.

Newer versions of Visual Studio should work on Python 3.5.

If you install Visual Studio you should be able to build pyodbc without any errors.

error: command 'cl.exe' failed: No such file or directory

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