Sstrhsrtj

On a clean install of Linux Mint 18.3 I ran the following commands through the terminal:

sudo apt install python-pip

pip install install --upgrade pip

pip install future

pip install six

Now when I run pip install <package name> or sudo pip install <package name> neither works. Generally I'll get an error message that looks like this:

Traceback (most recent call last):

  File "/usr/bin/pip", line 9, in <module>

    from pip import main

ImportError: cannot import name main

I think it was the pip install install --upgrade pip command that broke everything but yeah this was a terrible idea and I've given up on what I was trying to. All I want now it to return my system python to it's factory setting without having to completely reinstall Linux Mint. Is that possible?

If you're issue is being on too-modern a version of pip (10+), you can always revert it to the previous version (e.g., pip 9.0.3 which was the last version prior to pip 10). You can do this from the command line:

pip install pip==9.0.3

I am on a virtualbox linuxmint 18 Sarah installation.
I got into a real mess when I tried to update pip.
(eventually a missing frozen keyword when using the new pip for installations)

After trying to follow the various instructions like the one above, I did a brute force reinstall until I could run my python tests again and continue development.

Here it goes:

• First the system upgrade (apt update && apt upgrade)


• 
  

  then remove all python installations brute force
  
  (uninstalling python2.7 with the package manager will leave many
  broken packages behind)

  
  
  

  rm -f /usr/bin/pip*
  
  rm -rf /usr/lib/python2.7
  
  
  
  rm -f /usr/local/bin/pip*
  
  rm -f /usr/local/bin/pyt*
  
  rm -f /usr/local/bin/pip*
  
  rm -rf /usr/local/lib/python2.7
  
  
  
  rm -rf $HOME/.local/bin/pyt*
  
  rm -rf $HOME/.local/bin/pip*
  
  rm -rf $HOME/.local/lib/python2.7
  
  

  
  


• 
  

  reinstall python from linux packages giving a working pip

  
  
  

  apt install python2.7  --reinstall
  
  apt install python-pip --reinstall
  
  apt install python-setuptools --reinstall
  
  apt install python-pkg-resources  --reinstall
  
  

  
  


• 
  

  reinstall needed python package from using pip, e.g.:

  
  
  

  pip install wheel
  
  pip install grequests        
  
  pip install pytest
  
  pip install flask
  
  pip install chardet
  
  pip install prometheus_client
  
  pip install bs4
  
  

  
  

The python packages you need to reinstall might vary obviously for your setup.
I hope I didn't miss anything important from my command history, but you should get the general idea. The longest was the system upgrade. Everything else wen quite quick