What is the proper procedure way to install new packages for Mathematica?
In particular, when you download any notebook from MathWorld, you are are given a link to Mathworld packages, which is are zip files with dozens of .m files
Where do they go?
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Sometimes version inconsistencies drive me crazy while doing this. Am I the only one? – Dr. belisarius Jan 09 '11 at 23:38
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Not sure about version inconsistencies, but I spent last two hours trying to get my custom notation to work properly inside .m files, with no luck – Yaroslav Bulatov Jan 10 '11 at 06:35
3 Answers
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To have your packages that you've either downloaded or personally created visible to Mathematica, put them in $UserBaseDirectory/Applications, or $BaseDirectory/Applications if you want them accessible to all users on your system. Alternatively, version 8.0.4 (and likely earlier) has a menu option: File -> Install which will do it for you. The menu option brings up the following dialog
where the option "Install for this user only (name)" would install it under $UserBaseDirectory and the "for all users" option would install it under $BaseDirectory.
For more information on where Mathematica places everything I would read this tutorial, and look through directory operations functionality.
rcollyer
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If they are just temporary packages, it is often easier to load them from the current directory, but otherwise moving the files to anywhere on $Path (such as $UserBaseDirectory/Applications as suggested by rcollyer) will work although some directories are autoloaded.
My usual solution is to have
SetDirectory[NotebookDirectory[]]
as more or less the first line in all notebooks. I can then load packages from the notebook directory with Needs["foo"]`. For versioning, you can use the more verbose form of needs:
Needs["foo`","foo-001.m"]
Janus
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Under Windows it is often better to use %AllUsersProfile% directory instead of %UserProfile% for storing additional packages. The following command gives the path to the corresponding directory under Windows:
First@ReadList["!cmd /C echo %AllUsersProfile%",
String] <> "\\Application Data\\Mathematica\\Applications"
P.S. I think this and this answers of John Fultz are relevant.
Alexey Popkov
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2@Mr.Wizard It is a matter of personal preference. It is often easier to share all the beneficial changes for all accounts of multi-user computer, so you had no questions as to why the same work under one account, but it does not work under others. – Alexey Popkov Apr 26 '11 at 02:47