# Language: python with system\_site\_packages failing in Xenial

**URL:** <https://travis-ci.community/t/language-python-with-system-site-packages-failing-in-xenial/5261>\
**Category:** Xenial\
**Tags:** build-env, python, travis-build\
**Created:** [September 30, 2019, 9:55am UTC](https://travis-ci.community/t/language-python-with-system-site-packages-failing-in-xenial/5261 "2019-09-30T09:55:59Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 2

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**Author:** ![native-api](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex015/user_avatar/travis-ci.community/native-api/32/430_2.png) [@native-api](https://travis-ci.community/u/native-api)\
**Post date:** [September 30, 2019, 12:31pm UTC](https://travis-ci.community/t/language-python-with-system-site-packages-failing-in-xenial/5261/2 "2019-09-30T12:31:24Z")

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> [@Python 3.6 and 3.7 with system\_site\_packages enabled fails to activate on xenial](https://travis-ci.community/t/python-3-6-and-3-7-with-system-site-packages-enabled-fails-to-activate-on-xenial/1697/2):
>
> You don’t. "System site-packages" is only a thing for Python versions provided by distro – which for Xenial are [2.7.12](https://packages.ubuntu.com/xenial-updates/python) and [3.5.1](https://packages.ubuntu.com/xenial/python3). Other Python versions are installed manually (into /opt as of this writing), and the only global packages there are pip and setuptools (you can see all this by examining the Python tarball that the build log refers to). So if you’re using alternative Python versions, you don’t have access to any apt-get Python packages anyway. As such, the most straightforward solu…

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