Getting Started

Welcome to Poriscope! This section helps you get up and running with the application.

Alright, ready to dive in? Here’s everything you need to get Poriscope installed and running smoothly.

Prerequisites

Before installing Poriscope, make sure you have the following installed:

1. Git

   Check by running:

   git --version
   

   If Git is not installed, download it here: https://git-scm.com/downloads

2. Python 3.12.10

   Required version. Check by running:

   python --version
   

   If not installed, download it here: https://www.python.org/downloads/release/python-31210/

   Important

   During installation, make sure to check the box that says “Add Python to PATH”.

   Note

   Conda is not supported. You can make it work, but you’re on your own. Poriscope is built for standard pip environments.

3. MSYS2 (Optional)

   Required only if you need to compile the Wavelet DLL manually.

   • Download and install from: https://www.msys2.org/

   To check if you already have a compatible build tool installed:

   mingw32-make --version
   

Installation

As a developer, install Poriscope in editable mode:

git clone https://github.com/TCossaLab/poriscope.git
cd poriscope
pip install -e .

This allows live code edits without reinstallation.

Note

If you have a previous version of Poriscope installed, uninstall it first:

pip uninstall poriscope

Installing the Stable Version

To install the latest stable version (recommended for general users — does not track future updates unless reinstalled manually):

python -m pip install -U "git+https://github.com/TCossaLab/poriscope.git@main"

Launching Poriscope

Once everything is installed, run the application using:

From any terminal:

poriscope

Or from the local repo directly:

cd app
python main_app.py

If the command is not found, make sure your Python environment’s Scripts/ (Windows) or bin/ (Linux/macOS) folder is added to your system PATH.

Warning

Installation vs PATH

• If you don’t install Poriscope (skip python -m pip install -e . or the GitHub install), it won’t be importable and you can’t launch it.

• If Python is not on PATH, only the convenience command poriscope will fail. You can still run python -m poriscope and import Poriscope in your scripts, as long as it’s installed in the same Python interpreter you use.

Tip

To keep things in sync, if you have multiple python versions, make sure you always use the same interpreter for install and run.

Documentation

The official documentation is available at:

https://tcossalab.github.io/poriscope/

You’re all set — time to explore Poriscope!