Tutorial: Building a Python Windows Distribution Package

Introduction

In my previous open-source project MaterialSearch, many users requested a Windows-integrated version because configuring the environment on Windows can be quite troublesome—especially for beginners who may not know how to install everything properly. So I decided to try building a standalone Windows package.

Steps

Create a new folder called MaterialSearchWindows.
Download the project source code, extract it, and copy the contents into the MaterialSearchWindows/MaterialSearch directory.
Download Python. Since PyTorch supports up to Python 3.10 on Windows, we’ll use that version. Download the Windows installer (64-bit) and install it as a user into a specific folder—directly into MaterialSearch.

Use pip to install dependencies. Run the following command:

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.\python -m pip install -r .\MaterialSearch\requirements.txt --index-url=https://download.pytorch.org/whl/cu118 --extra-index-url=https://pypi.org/simple/

Create a new batch file called run.bat with the following content. Execute it to let the model download completely:
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SET TRANSFORMERS_CACHE=..\huggingface cd MaterialSearch ..\python main.py

After the model is downloaded, modify run.bat with the following:

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:: Configure asset scan paths, separated by commas
SET ASSETS_PATH=C:/Users/Administrator/Pictures,C:/Users/Administrator/Videos
:: Configure the device: cpu or cuda
SET DEVICE=cpu
SET DEVICE_TEXT=cpu
:: Do not modify below
SET PATH=%PATH%;..\
SET TRANSFORMERS_OFFLINE=1
SET TRANSFORMERS_CACHE=..\huggingface
cd MaterialSearch
..\python main.py

Download FFMpeg, extract it, and copy ffmpeg.exe into the MaterialSearchWindows directory.
Finally, compress the entire folder into a zip package. To launch the program later, simply run run.bat.

The final directory structure should look like this:

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MaterialSearchWindows
 |
 |- run.bat (the batch script you created)
 |- MaterialSearch (project code directory)
     |
     |- main.py
     |- .env
     |- ... (other code files)
 |- python.exe
 |- huggingface (transformers model cache)
 |- ... (other Python-related files)