import doesn't notice changes to working directory

[purpleidea]

BPO	8955
Nosy	@bitdancer
Files	import_bug.tar: Tarball of necessary files for testing

^{Note: these values reflect the state of the issue at the time it was migrated and might not reflect the current state.}

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GitHub fields:

assignee = None
closed_at = <Date 2010-06-09.17:39:55.168>
created_at = <Date 2010-06-09.15:44:14.310>
labels = ['invalid', 'type-bug', 'library']
title = "import doesn't notice changes to working directory"
updated_at = <Date 2010-06-09.17:39:55.163>
user = 'https://bugs.python.org/purpleidea'

bugs.python.org fields:

activity = <Date 2010-06-09.17:39:55.163>
actor = 'r.david.murray'
assignee = 'none'
closed = True
closed_date = <Date 2010-06-09.17:39:55.168>
closer = 'r.david.murray'
components = ['Library (Lib)']
creation = <Date 2010-06-09.15:44:14.310>
creator = 'purpleidea'
dependencies = []
files = ['17600']
hgrepos = []
issue_num = 8955
keywords = []
message_count = 2.0
messages = ['107403', '107407']
nosy_count = 2.0
nosy_names = ['r.david.murray', 'purpleidea']
pr_nums = []
priority = 'normal'
resolution = 'not a bug'
stage = 'resolved'
status = 'closed'
superseder = None
type = 'behavior'
url = 'https://bugs.python.org/issue8955'
versions = ['Python 2.6', 'Python 3.1']

[purpleidea]

Attempting to change the working directory and then import based on that change has no effect. Import seems impossible. Attached is tarball example. As seen below, bar1.py can import foo from src, however bar2.py bar3.py and bar4.py cannot, despite their respective scripts changing their cwd. Below is results of a terminal session. Thanks in advance.

james@hostname:~$ tree import_bug/
import_bug/
|-- bar1.py
|-- init.py
|-- src
| |-- foo.py
| -- __init__.py -- test
|-- bar2.py
|-- bar3.py
|-- bar4.py
|-- bar5.py
`-- init.py

2 directories, 9 files
james@hostname:~$ cat import_bug/src/foo.py
# this is foo.py
print('this is foo.py')

james@hostname:~$ cat import_bug/bar1.py
# this is bar1.py
import os

print(os.getcwd())
from src import foo
print('this is bar1.py')

james@hostname:~$ cat import_bug/test/bar2.py
# this is bar2.py
import os

os.chdir(os.path.join(os.path.dirname(file), os.pardir))

print(os.getcwd())
from src import foo
print('this is bar2.py')

james@hostname:~$ python import_bug/bar1.py 
/home/james
this is foo.py
this is bar1.py
james@hostname:~$ python import_bug/test/bar2.py 
/home/james/import_bug
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "import_bug/test/bar2.py", line 7, in <module>
    from src import foo
ImportError: No module named src
james@hostname:~$

[bitdancer]

This is working as designed.

Try printing sys.path in your scripts. It is what's in sys.path that matters, not the cwd. (The cwd is put in the path as "" in the specific case of running the python interactive shell...and in certain applications that embed Python because of a bug in those applications.)