"ImportError: No module named pyaudio" despite python-pyaudio installed

I am trying to run a Python program that uses pyaudio:

1. I download the program (from Github because the .deb is too old)
2. I install python-pyaudio
3. I run the program
4. The program says ImportError: No module named 'pyaudio'

What am I doing wrong?

$ sudo apt-get install python-pyaudio
[sudo] password for nico:
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
Suggested packages: python-pyaudio-doc
The following NEW packages will be installed: python-pyaudio
0 upgraded, 1 newly installed, 0 to remove and 49 not upgraded.
Need to get 0 B/24.1 kB of archives.
After this operation, 109 kB of additional disk space will be used.
Selecting previously unselected package python-pyaudio.
(Reading database ... 336001 files and directories currently installed.)
Preparing to unpack .../python-pyaudio_0.2.8-1build2_amd64.deb ...
Unpacking python-pyaudio (0.2.8-1build2) ...
Setting up python-pyaudio (0.2.8-1build2) ...
$ ./runanki
Traceback (most recent call last): File "./runanki", line 3, in <module> import aqt File "/home/nico/src/anki/aqt/__init__.py", line 4, in <module> from anki import version as _version File "/home/nico/src/anki/anki/__init__.py", line 13, in <module> from anki.storage import Collection File "/home/nico/src/anki/anki/storage.py", line 12, in <module> from anki.collection import _Collection File "/home/nico/src/anki/anki/collection.py", line 26, in <module> from anki.sound import stripSounds File "/home/nico/src/anki/anki/sound.py", line 207, in <module> import pyaudio
ImportError: No module named 'pyaudio'

Environment:

$ which python
/usr/bin/python
$ python --version
Python 2.7.11+

1 Answer

The cause of the problem is that the shebang of the runanki script at explicitly states Python 3, so ./runanki invokes the Python 3 interpreter but you had installed pyaudio for Python 2. As a result, Python 3 is not able to find pyaudio and therefore raises an ImportError. The easiest solution here is to install the Python 3 bindings for pyaudio by running:

sudo apt update && sudo apt install python3-pyaudio