# VTK not found in python after conda install
**URL:** https://discourse.vtk.org/t/vtk-not-found-in-python-after-conda-install/6251
**Category:** Support
**Created:** [July 27, 2021, 1:06pm UTC](https://discourse.vtk.org/t/vtk-not-found-in-python-after-conda-install/6251 "2021-07-27T13:06:34Z")
**Posts on this page:** 8
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@sandwich](https://discourse.vtk.org/u/sandwich)
#### Post date: [July 27, 2021, 1:06pm UTC](https://discourse.vtk.org/t/vtk-not-found-in-python-after-conda-install/6251/1 "2021-07-27T13:06:34Z")
I am attempting to install and run [mayavi](https://docs.enthought.com/mayavi/mayavi/) through python using conda on windows 10. I have run:
> [@](#):
>
> ```
> conda create -n ssms_gias python=3.7
> conda install -n ssms_gias pyqt=5
> conda install -n ssms_gias -c menpo mayavi
>
> ```
According to conda, I have vtk 8.2.0 installed after running these commands.
However, after attempting to start mayavi by running mayavi2, I get the following error:
> [@](#):
>
> ImportError: No module named ‘vtkCommonCorePython’
Searching through other forum topics, I have added a PYTHONPATH environment variable to the directory containing vtkCommonCorePython.pyd:
> [@](#):
>
> PYTHONPATH=C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\envs\ssms\_gias\Lib\site-packages\vtkmodules
Now, when attempting to import vtk in python I get the following:
> [@](#):
>
> Traceback (most recent call last):
> File “C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\envs\ssms\_gias\lib\site-packages\vtkmodules\vtkCommonCore.py”, line 5, in
> from .vtkCommonCorePython import \*
> ImportError: DLL load failed: The specified module could not be found.
>
> During handling of the above exception, another exception occurred:
>
> Traceback (most recent call last):
> File “”, line 1, in
> File “C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\envs\ssms\_gias\lib\site-packages\vtk.py”, line 32, in
> all\_spec.loader.exec\_module(all\_m)
> File “C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\envs\ssms\_gias\lib\site-packages\vtkmodules\all.py”, line 7, in
> from .vtkCommonCore import \*
> File “C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\envs\ssms\_gias\lib\site-packages\vtkmodules\vtkCommonCore.py”, line 9, in
> from vtkCommonCorePython import \*
> ImportError: DLL load failed: The specified module could not be found.
**Configuration Info:**
Windows 10 Version 20H2 OS Build 19042.1110
conda version : 4.10.3
python version : 3.7.3.final.0
pyqt version: 5.9.2
vtk version: 8.2.0
---
### Author:  [@ben.boeckel](https://discourse.vtk.org/u/ben.boeckel)
#### Post date: [July 27, 2021, 1:15pm UTC](https://discourse.vtk.org/t/vtk-not-found-in-python-after-conda-install/6251/2 "2021-07-27T13:15:42Z")
On Windows, you probably need to manually add `PATH` entries to the main `bin` paths where the main DLLs live. This was fixed in VTK 9.0 with Python 3.9+ (through APIs that are not available before then, namely `os.add_dll_directory`).
---
### Author:  [@sandwich](https://discourse.vtk.org/u/sandwich)
#### Post date: [July 27, 2021, 1:37pm UTC](https://discourse.vtk.org/t/vtk-not-found-in-python-after-conda-install/6251/3 "2021-07-27T13:37:33Z")
Thanks for the quick response! regrettably it looks like Mayavi requires python 3.7, so I am stuck with VTK 8.2. I have added a `PATH` entry and a `PYTHONPATH` entry to that directory (`C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\envs\ssms_gias\Library\bin`), and the error still persists.
Is there another environment variable that I should be using?
latest stack trace:
> [@](#):
>
> $ python -c “import vtk”
> Traceback (most recent call last):
> File “C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\envs\ssms\_gias\lib\site-packages\vtkmodules\vtkCommonCore.py”, line 5, in
> from .vtkCommonCorePython import \*
> ImportError: DLL load failed: The specified module could not be found.
>
> During handling of the above exception, another exception occurred:
>
> Traceback (most recent call last):
> File “”, line 1, in
> File “C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\envs\ssms\_gias\lib\site-packages\vtk.py”, line 32, in
> all\_spec.loader.exec\_module(all\_m)
> File “C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\envs\ssms\_gias\lib\site-packages\vtkmodules\all.py”, line 7, in
> from .vtkCommonCore import \*
> File “C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\envs\ssms\_gias\lib\site-packages\vtkmodules\vtkCommonCore.py”, line 9, in
> from vtkCommonCorePython import \*
> ImportError: DLL load failed: The specified module could not be found.
Entries in `PATH`:
> [@](#):
>
> C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\envs\ssms\_gias
> C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\envs\ssms\_gias\Library\mingw-w64\bin
> C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\envs\ssms\_gias\Library\usr\bin
> C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\envs\ssms\_gias\Library\bin
> C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\envs\ssms\_gias\Scripts
> C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\envs\ssms\_gias\bin
> C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3
> C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\Library\mingw-w64\bin
> C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\Library\usr\bin
> C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\Library\bin
> C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\Scripts
> C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\bin
> C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\condabin
> C:\Program Files (x86)\NVIDIA Corporation\PhysX\Common
> C:\WINDOWS\system32
> C:\WINDOWS
> C:\WINDOWS\System32\Wbem
> C:\WINDOWS\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0
> C:\WINDOWS\System32\OpenSSH
> C:\Program Files\Docker\Docker\resources\bin
> C:\ProgramData\DockerDesktop\version-bin
> C:\Program Files\MySQL\MySQL Shell 8.0\bin
> C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\envs\ssms\_gias\Library\bin
PythonPath:
`PYTHONPATH=C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\envs\ssms_gias\Lib\site-packages\vtkmodules;C:\ProgramData\Miniconda3\envs\ssms_gias\Library\bin`
---
### Author:  [@ben.boeckel](https://discourse.vtk.org/u/ben.boeckel)
#### Post date: [July 27, 2021, 3:31pm UTC](https://discourse.vtk.org/t/vtk-not-found-in-python-after-conda-install/6251/4 "2021-07-27T15:31:45Z")
Python 3.9 has more useful info there (like…the name of that not-found library), but you can use [ProcessMonitor](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/downloads/procmon) to figure out which library is actually not being found.
---
### Author:  [@sandwich](https://discourse.vtk.org/u/sandwich)
#### Post date: [July 27, 2021, 5:05pm UTC](https://discourse.vtk.org/t/vtk-not-found-in-python-after-conda-install/6251/5 "2021-07-27T17:05:55Z")
Thanks for the tip.
The dll that seems to not be found is `tbb.dll`, which as far as I can tell is Intel’s thread builder and should be non essential. All of the following were successfully checked at a file level (they went through the operations of `CreateFile, QueryBasicInformationFile, CloseFile, CreateFileMapping,` and `Load Image` successfully.
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> vtkCommonCorePython37D-8.2.dll
> VCRUNTIME140\_1.dll
> vtkWrappingPython37Core-8.2.dll
> vtkCommonCore-8.2.dll
> vtksys-8.2.dll
I have attached events that python.exe reported, if you are willing to take a closer look, although, it appeared that most of it was successful.
There were some calls to files that were never found, in particular:
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>
> **init**.cp37-win\_amd64.pyd
> **init**.pyd
> python37.\_pth
> python.\_pth
> python37.zip
> pyvenv.cfg
> tbb.dll
[python\_attempt.CSV](https://discourse.vtk.org/uploads/short-url/9vYke7PDHR35gs8bOmb3dBbbMdk.CSV) (631.4 KB)
[python\_attemptPML.PML](https://discourse.vtk.org/uploads/short-url/2F04iz6J1HZUBTXcMpIkz3MCIz1.PML) (3.4 MB)
---
### Author:  [@ben.boeckel](https://discourse.vtk.org/u/ben.boeckel)
#### Post date: [July 27, 2021, 5:54pm UTC](https://discourse.vtk.org/t/vtk-not-found-in-python-after-conda-install/6251/6 "2021-07-27T17:54:08Z")
> [@sandwich](#):
>
> The dll that seems to not be found is `tbb.dll`, which as far as I can tell is Intel’s thread builder and should be non essential.
It’s essential if the SMP backend is TBB.
> [@sandwich](#):
>
> There were some calls to files that were never found
This is fine. Python tries extensions in order, so ` __init__.py` is going to be attempted after those two `.pyd` extension filenames.
---
### Author:  [@sandwich](https://discourse.vtk.org/u/sandwich)
#### Post date: [July 28, 2021, 9:25am UTC](https://discourse.vtk.org/t/vtk-not-found-in-python-after-conda-install/6251/7 "2021-07-28T09:25:13Z")
Hi Ben, thanks for your replies so far. I have tbb.dll from other applications, and have copied it into a source where it was found by the project. I am now able to get further, but now when importing `vtkIOParallelPython` I get the following error:
`ImportError: DLL load failed: The specified procedure could not be found.`
ProcMon shows no unresolved dependencies found, so I speculate that I have a wrong copy of tbb.dll. Would there be any place I can search to find the right version? Alternately, do you have any other thoughts?
---
### Author:  [@ben.boeckel](https://discourse.vtk.org/u/ben.boeckel)
#### Post date: [July 28, 2021, 1:16pm UTC](https://discourse.vtk.org/t/vtk-not-found-in-python-after-conda-install/6251/8 "2021-07-28T13:16:53Z")
The right `tbb.dll` is the one corresponding to the one VTK built against. You’ll have to interrogate Anaconda as to how it got TBB into the VTK build.