Installing Anaconda on MacOS

Download Anaconda

From Anaconda site

  1. Download Anaconda installer for MacOS from here: https://www.anaconda.com/download/
  2. Choose Python 2.7 or Python 3.6, read python2 vs python3

From Anaconda repository

  1. Download Anaconda installer for MacOS from here: https://repo.continuum.io/archive/ from the browser.
  2. There are two type .sh and .pkg, .sh requires you to use the Terminal.app while .pkg install with double-click.
  3. Here I will show you how to install via Terminal.app

Installing Anaconda via Terminal.app

  1. Open up a terminal.
  2. cd to your instaler folder, usually ~/Downloads/.
  3. Type sh ./AnacondaXXXXXXXX.sh, where AnacondaXXXXXXXX.sh refers to the downloaded file name.
  4. Follow the instructions on the screen. Accept the defaults if you are not sure what to do :stuck_out_tongue:.
  5. Installation will be finished within 5 minutes.
  6. The following line will be appeared: Do you wish the installer to prepend the AnacondaX install location to PATH in your /Users/XXX/.bash_profile ? [yes|no]
  7. If you use bash, you can type yes for easy installation. Read the next session about PATH variable
  8. Everything is done. Refresh your bash terminal by source ~/.bash_profile

Anaconda PATH variable

The Anaconda will NOT append the PATH variable during Linux installation. To qurantee your installation is successful, you need to check your rcfile for Bash, i.e. the .bash_profile stored under the Home directory of MacOS. To read the .bash_profile:

  1. Type cat ~/.bash_profile in your terminal.
  2. If you have the following lines at the end, it means the installation is ok. 
    # added by Anaconda2 installer
export PATH="/Users/XXXXX/anacondaX/bin:$PATH"
  3. If you doesn’t got this line, first check the Anaconda installation location (usually /Users/XXXXX/anacondaX/) and add the following line (Replace /Users/XXXXX/anacondaX/ with your installation location) to ~/.bash_profile using a text editor: 
    export PATH="/Users/XXXXX/anacondaX/bin:$PATH"
  4. If you have no idea what is a text editor, open a terminal, type echo "export PATH="/Users/XXXXX/anacondaX/bin:$PATH"" >> ~/.bash_profile and enter, of course you need to replace your installation folder here.

Successful Anaconda installation

  1. Run source ~/.bash_profile in the terminal.
  2. Type python in the terminal.
  3. Similar strings will be appeared: :heavy_check_mark: 
    Python 2.7.14 |Anaconda custom (64-bit)| (default, Oct 16 2017, 17:29:19) 
[GCC 7.2.0] on linux2
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
  4. If the following similar strings appeared, redo the previous session or run source ~/.bash_profile in the terminal. :heavy_multiplication_x: 
    Python 2.7.14 (default, Jan  5 2018, 10:41:29) 
[GCC 7.2.1 20171224] on linux2
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.

Updating conda

  1. Open a terminal.
  2. Run conda update anaconda.

Uninstalling conda

  1. Open a terminal.
  2. Check the Anaconda installation path.
  3. Usually ~/anacondaX/
  4. Run rm -fr ~/anacondaX/
  5. Open your ~/.bash_profile
  6. Find and remove the line export PATH="/Users/XXXXX/anacondaX/bin:$PATH"
  7. Run source ~/.bash_profile