.. _install: 

Installation
============

The below will help you quickly install Firefly so you can create your own Firefly visualization.

.. note::
    Viewing an existing Firefly instance requires no installation.
    Simply navigate to the visualization web address with a modern web browser.

Requirements
------------

You will need a working Python installation; we recommend installing `Anaconda <https://www.anaconda.com/download/>`_ Python version 3.x.
You will also need to install the following packages:

    * numpy

    * h5py
    
    * pandas
    
    * eventlet
    
    * flask
    
    * flask-socketio

    * requests

Installing the latest stable release
------------------------------------

Install the latest stable release with

.. code-block:: bash

    pip install firefly

This is the preferred way to install Firefly as it will
automatically install the necessary requirements and put Firefly
into your :code:`${PYTHONPATH}` environment variable so you can 
import it.

Install from source
-------------------

Alternatively, you can install the latest version directly from the most up-to-date version
of the source-code by cloning/forking the GitHub repository 

.. code-block:: bash

    git clone https://github.com/ageller/Firefly.git


Once you have the source, you can build Firefly (and add it to your environment)
by executing

.. code-block:: bash

    python setup.py install

or

.. code-block:: bash

    pip install -e .

in the top level directory. The required Python packages will automatically be 
installed as well.

You can test your installation by looking for the firefly 
executable built by the installation

.. code-block:: bash

    which firefly

and by importing the Firefly Python frontend in Python

.. code-block:: python

    import firefly