Installation

Prerequisites

Before installing, ensure you have Python 3.10 or later. You can check your Python version by running the following command in your terminal:

python --version

Create a virtual environment

It’s highly recommended to install sm_bluesky within a virtual environment. This isolates the project’s dependencies and prevents conflicts with other Python installations.

python3 -m venv /path/to/venv

Replace /path/to/your/venv with the desired directory for your virtual environment (e.g., ~/sm_venv).

Activate the virtual environment:

source /path/to/venv/bin/activate

(On Windows, use \path\to\your\venv\Scripts\activate)

Once activated, your terminal prompt will typically change to indicate that the virtual environment is active.

Installing the sm_bluesky Library

With the virtual environment activated, you can now install sm_bluesky using pip:

$ python3 -m pip install sm_bluesky

To include optional dependencies for the interactive BlueAPI client (ipython, matplotlib, blueapi) or instrument servers (pyserial, zhinst-core, blueapi):

# Install with interactive client dependencies
$ python3 -m pip install "sm_bluesky[client]"

# Install with instrument server dependencies
$ python3 -m pip install "sm_bluesky[server]"

To install the latest development version directly from GitHub:

$ python3 -m pip install git+https://github.com/DiamondLightSource/sm-bluesky.git

Verifying the Installation

After installation, you can verify that sm_bluesky is installed correctly and check its version by running:

$ sm-bluesky --version

This command should display the installed version number.