Pip module fails to build with Python 3.13

[Iktomist]

Describe the issue:

Since distutils is deprecated, it's been removed in Python 3.13.

That means that trying to install Numpy via pip package gives this error:

Reproduce the code example:

me@mA13:~/Downloads$ pip3 install numpy
Defaulting to user installation because normal site-packages is not writeable
Collecting numpy
  Downloading numpy-1.25.2.tar.gz (10.8 MB)
     ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 10.8/10.8 MB 1.6 MB/s eta 0:00:00
  Installing build dependencies ... done
  Getting requirements to build wheel ... done

Error message:

ERROR: Exception:
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_internal/cli/base_command.py", line 180, in exc_logging_wrapper
    status = run_func(*args)
             ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_internal/cli/req_command.py", line 248, in wrapper
    return func(self, options, args)
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_internal/commands/install.py", line 377, in run
    requirement_set = resolver.resolve(
                      ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_internal/resolution/resolvelib/resolver.py", line 92, in resolve
    result = self._result = resolver.resolve(
                            ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_vendor/resolvelib/resolvers.py", line 546, in resolve
    state = resolution.resolve(requirements, max_rounds=max_rounds)
            ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_vendor/resolvelib/resolvers.py", line 397, in resolve
    self._add_to_criteria(self.state.criteria, r, parent=None)
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_vendor/resolvelib/resolvers.py", line 173, in _add_to_criteria
    if not criterion.candidates:
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_vendor/resolvelib/structs.py", line 156, in __bool__
    return bool(self._sequence)
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_internal/resolution/resolvelib/found_candidates.py", line 155, in __bool__
    return any(self)
           ^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_internal/resolution/resolvelib/found_candidates.py", line 143, in <genexpr>
    return (c for c in iterator if id(c) not in self._incompatible_ids)
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_internal/resolution/resolvelib/found_candidates.py", line 47, in _iter_built
    candidate = func()
                ^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_internal/resolution/resolvelib/factory.py", line 206, in _make_candidate_from_link
    self._link_candidate_cache[link] = LinkCandidate(
                                       ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_internal/resolution/resolvelib/candidates.py", line 293, in __init__
    super().__init__(
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_internal/resolution/resolvelib/candidates.py", line 156, in __init__
    self.dist = self._prepare()
                ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_internal/resolution/resolvelib/candidates.py", line 225, in _prepare
    dist = self._prepare_distribution()
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_internal/resolution/resolvelib/candidates.py", line 304, in _prepare_distribution
    return preparer.prepare_linked_requirement(self._ireq, parallel_builds=True)
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_internal/operations/prepare.py", line 538, in prepare_linked_requirement
    return self._prepare_linked_requirement(req, parallel_builds)
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_internal/operations/prepare.py", line 653, in _prepare_linked_requirement
    dist = _get_prepared_distribution(
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_internal/operations/prepare.py", line 69, in _get_prepared_distribution
    abstract_dist.prepare_distribution_metadata(
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_internal/distributions/sdist.py", line 48, in prepare_distribution_metadata
    self._install_build_reqs(finder)
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_internal/distributions/sdist.py", line 118, in _install_build_reqs
    build_reqs = self._get_build_requires_wheel()
                 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_internal/distributions/sdist.py", line 95, in _get_build_requires_wheel
    return backend.get_requires_for_build_wheel()
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_internal/utils/misc.py", line 697, in get_requires_for_build_wheel
    return super().get_requires_for_build_wheel(config_settings=cs)
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_vendor/pyproject_hooks/_impl.py", line 166, in get_requires_for_build_wheel
    return self._call_hook('get_requires_for_build_wheel', {
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_vendor/pyproject_hooks/_impl.py", line 321, in _call_hook
    raise BackendUnavailable(data.get('traceback', ''))
pip._vendor.pyproject_hooks._impl.BackendUnavailable: Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/site-packages/pip/_vendor/pyproject_hooks/_in_process/_in_process.py", line 77, in _build_backend
    obj = import_module(mod_path)
          ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/local/lib/python3.13/importlib/__init__.py", line 88, in import_module
    return _bootstrap._gcd_import(name[level:], package, level)
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 1293, in _gcd_import
  File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 1266, in _find_and_load
  File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 1216, in _find_and_load_unlocked
  File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 400, in _call_with_frames_removed
  File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 1293, in _gcd_import
  File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 1266, in _find_and_load
  File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 1237, in _find_and_load_unlocked
  File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 841, in _load_unlocked
  File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap_external>", line 1002, in exec_module
  File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 400, in _call_with_frames_removed
  File "/tmp/pip-build-env-vg8lvg3i/overlay/lib/python3.13/site-packages/setuptools/__init__.py", line 10, in <module>
    import distutils.core
ModuleNotFoundError: No module named 'distutils'

Runtime information:

(No currently running NumPy installation)

Context for the issue:

The latest version of the NumPy sources should come with detailed instructions for compiling NumPy and requirements from source.

[mattip]

pip install numpy with 3.13 shouldn't work. That version is clearly marked for python 3.9, 3.10, 3.11 only.

[rgommers]

Indeed. If you use CPython main, please install from NumPy main too @Iktomist. There's nothing to do here, so I will close this issue.

[domdfcoding]

Even with numpy main I can't get it to build due to meson lacking Python 3.13 support (mesonbuild/meson#12401)

[rgommers]

Thanks @domdfcoding. I'll get that fixed.

[rgommers]

Okay, I had a look and that'll be a while. I fixed two of the issues, and then hit:

numpy/random/bit_generator.cpython-313-x86_64-linux-gnu.so.p/numpy/random/bit_generator.pyx.c:19614:35: error: ‘_PyObject_NextNotImplemented’ undeclared (first use in this function); did you mean ‘PyObject_HashNotImplemented’?
19614 |         if (unlikely(iternext == &_PyObject_NextNotImplemented))

That's a private function used by Cython.

There's a reason we don't test with Python pre-releases until May or so - lots of things get randomly broken. I'll fix up a few things, but then it's up to whoever cares about this to submit patches. It's about 6 months early for us to really worry about Python 3.13.