How to write setup.py to include a Git repository as a dependency

A more general answer: To get the information from the requirements.txt file I do:

from setuptools import setup, find_packages
from os import path

loc = path.abspath(path.dirname(__file__))

with open(loc + '/requirements.txt') as f:
    requirements = f.read().splitlines()

required = []
dependency_links = []

# Do not add to required lines pointing to Git repositories
EGG_MARK = '#egg='
for line in requirements:
    if line.startswith('-e git:') or line.startswith('-e git+') or \
            line.startswith('git:') or line.startswith('git+'):
        line = line.lstrip('-e ')  # in case that is using "-e"
        if EGG_MARK in line:
            package_name = line[line.find(EGG_MARK) + len(EGG_MARK):]
            repository = line[:line.find(EGG_MARK)]
            required.append('%s @ %s' % (package_name, repository))
            dependency_links.append(line)
        else:
            print('Dependency to a git repository should have the format:')
            print('git+ssh://[email protected]/xxxxx/xxxxxx#egg=package_name')
    else:
        required.append(line)

setup(
    name='myproject',  # Required
    version='0.0.1',  # Required
    description='Description here....',  # Required
    packages=find_packages(),  # Required
    install_requires=required,
    dependency_links=dependency_links,
)

This answer has been updated regularly as Python has evolved over the years. Scroll to the bottom for the most current answer, or read through to see how this has evolved.

Unfortunately the other answer does not work with private repositories, which is one of the most common use cases for this. I eventually did get it working with a setup.py file that looks like this (now deprecated) method:

from setuptools import setup, find_packages

setup(
    name = 'MyProject',
    version = '0.1.0',
    url = '',
    description = '',
    packages = find_packages(),
    install_requires = [
        # Github Private Repository - needs entry in `dependency_links`
        'ExampleRepo'
    ],

    dependency_links=[
        # Make sure to include the `#egg` portion so the `install_requires` recognizes the package
        'git+ssh://[email protected]/example_org/ExampleRepo.git#egg=ExampleRepo-0.1'
    ]
)

Newer versions of pip make this even easier by removing the need to use "dependency_links"-

from setuptools import setup, find_packages

setup(
    name = 'MyProject',
    version = '0.1.0',
    url = '',
    description = '',
    packages = find_packages(),
    install_requires = [
        # Github Private Repository
        'ExampleRepo @ git+ssh://[email protected]/example_org/ExampleRepo.git#egg=ExampleRepo-0.1'
    ]
)

However, with the very latest pip you'll run into issues with the EGG format handler. This is because while the egg is ignored pip is now doing direct URL matching and will consider two URLs, one with the egg fragment and the other without, to be completely different versions even if they point to the same package. As such it's best to leave any egg fragments off.

June 2021 - setup.py

So, the best way (current to June 2021) to add a dependency from Github to your setup.py that will work with public and private repositories:

from setuptools import setup, find_packages

setup(
    name = 'MyProject',
    version = '0.1.0',
    url = '',
    description = '',
    packages = find_packages(),
    install_requires = [
        # Github Private Repository
        'ExampleRepo @ git+ssh://[email protected]/example_org/ExampleRepo.git'
    ]
)

February 2022 - setup.cfg

Apparently setup.py is being deprecated (although my guess is it'll be around for awhile) and setup.cfg is the new thing.

[metadata]
name = MyProject
version = 0.1.1


[options]
packages = :find

install_requires =
  ExampleRepo @ git+ssh://[email protected]/example_org/ExampleRepo.git

June 16th 2022 - pyproject.toml

setup.cfg is already "pre" deprecated. as setuptools now has experimental support for pyproject.toml files.

This is the future, but since this is still experimental it should not be used in real projects for now. Even though setup.cfg is on its way out you should use it for a declarative format, otherwise setup.py is still the way to go. This answer will be updated when setuptools has stabilized their support of the new standard.

Note: this answer is now outdated. Have a look at this answer from @Dick Fox for up-to-date instructions: https://stackoverflow.com/a/54794506/2272172

---

You can find the right way to do it here.

dependency_links=['http://github.com/user/repo/tarball/master#egg=package-1.0']

The key is not to give a link to a Git repository, but a link to a tarball. GitHub creates a tarball of the master branch for you if you append /tarball/master as shown above.

After digging through the pip issue 3939 linked by @muon in the comments above and then the PEP-508 specification, I found success getting my private repo dependency to install via setup.py using this specification pattern in install_requires (no more dependency_links):

install_requires = [
  'some-pkg @ git+ssh://[email protected]/someorgname/[email protected]#egg=some-pkg',
]

The @v1.1 indicates the release tag created on github and could be replaced with a branch, commit, or different type of tag.