Permission Denied error: Python 3.8 on Windows Gitbash

Question

New to Python. I get the following error on doing a python --version on my GitBash. ...Appdata/Local/Microsoft/WindowsApps/python3: Permission Denied

Based on some answers on this forum I turned off the App execution aliases for python. Doing this deleted the two "stubs" python.exe and python3.exe from my Windows App folder and resulted in another error of No such file or directory to my python --version on GitBash.

I am a novice to python so it gets annoying to be stuck at the installation itself. What am I missing here ???

It's December and all these updates from Microsoft I assume has still not fixed this issue. Or?

Solution 1

To fix this Problem you need to install the required Python-Windows-Version (In my case it was 3.9). Then you search for Edit environment variables for your account in the startmenu. Open up the PATH-Variable and move the PATH for %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\WindowsApps below the PATH of your Python-Installation.

Now you enter manage app execution aliases into the windows search and deactivate the 2 Entrys for python there.

The last thing you need to do is to open your Python-Installation-Folder. This folder is usually at %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python39 (If you're using Python 3.9) Don't forget to change the path to your Python-version (e.g. Python38).

Copy the file python.exe in the same directory and rename the copy to python3.exe. So you have both python.exe and python3.exe in the installation-folder.

You can find a similar solution to this problem here

Solution 2

Solved: Python commands won't work on mintty. I did a python -i to enter the python mode Another option is to do a 'winpty python.exe'

Comments

[Mark]

Wow, this was quite the adventure but sure enough it worked for me. I was using VScode trying to use git filter-repo and until I did these steps, I had no luck. Thank you.

[CervEd]

don't copy the executable, make a symlink using mklink python3.exe python.exe instead, run the command in the Command Prompt with admin rights

[Dincio]

This answer was way quicker than the accepted one. Even though you do have to type a longer command.