Installing Leo using uv

[Satheesh Vattekkat]

I recently got a new machine and also recently had started playing with Astral uv. So far, I was using Leo from git with pip. Thought of trying installation with uv - turned out to be the simplest and fastest of the lot. This is on Linux (Mint and CachyOS) with uv being installed from System -> Software -> Add menu.

In fact, it is too straight forward that I am wondering if it is the right way :) My outlines worked fine and I edited few files too. Sharing, in case if it is useful.

```

mkdir leo-editor

cd leo-editor

uv init .

uv add docutils leo

# make launcher script

wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/leo-editor/leo-editor/refs/heads/devel/launchLeo.py

# run and test

uv run launchLeo.py

# to upgrade leo

uv sync -U

```

[Edward K. Ream]

On Sun, Dec 7, 2025 at 10:00 PM Satheesh Vattekkat <vsb...@gmail.com> wrote:

I recently got a new machine and also recently had started playing with Astral uv. So far, I was using Leo from git with pip. Thought of trying installation with uv - turned out to be the simplest and fastest of the lot. This is on Linux (Mint and CachyOS) with uv being installed from System -> Software -> Add menu.

In fact, it is too straight forward that I am wondering if it is the right way :) My outlines worked fine and I edited few files too. Sharing, in case if it is useful.

Hi Satheesh,

Thanks for checking in. This is the first I've heard of uv, but I'm glad it works for you.

Edward

[HaveF HaveF]

This is the first I've heard of uv, but I'm glad it works for you.

uv tools have become very popular now, mainly because it is very fast. 

Currently, many of my scripts are of this type(inline dependencies): Running scripts | uv

If you have not tried it yet, I suggest you try it!

[John Clark]

Actually, uv has been mentioned many times in this group (including myself) going back more than a year. Search the group for "astral" to find most of the occurrences.

[John Clark]

'uv' also provides the 'uvx' tool, which allows you to get Leo up and running in a single command:

uvx leo

uvx has heaps of options, including options to specify a specific version of leo (otherwise the default is to use the latest version)

Cheers

[HaveF HaveF]

uvx leo

Wow!

Since my Leo has always worked, I haven't reinstalled it. Thank you for letting me know that this works! 

[Satheesh Vattekkat]

uvx leo

Fantastic! Thank you so much. This is by far the fastest and easiest way to get started with installing leo.  Some additional notes:

1. For upgrade, I had to do `uv tool upgrade --all`

2. I clean  uv's cache once a month (`uv cache clean`) because in my case, it comes to about 2GB. This means `uvx leo` will again pull down its dependencies. I created a separate directory for leo and cd'ed into it and ran `uvx --cache-dir `pwd` leo`. That makes sure leo's dependencies are only in that directory and doesn't get cleaned. For upgrade, `uv cache-dir `pwd` tool upgrade --all` is good.

Time to really read all the options in uv and uvx. Thanks again for the help.

[lewis]

An interesting article on uv: How uv got so fast

[HaveF HaveF]

An interesting article on uv: How uv got so fast

How uv got so fast | Hacker News: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46393992 

[Israel Hands]

Some years ago I managed to instal Leo on to my Intel  Macbook Air, posted the details here: MacOS install Success - Mojave 

I am no expert and the process was fraught and lengthy... for me at least.  And eventually after an OS upgrade I lost Leo again on my Mac. And have been without for a couple of years now. So I was intrigued and thrilled when I saw your post.  My install using your suggested method was not completely pain free. I have Zshell installed, I don't know why... and that meant faff at least I think that was what caused the issues with where Homebrew is installed and creating and editing the .zshrc file and installing wget. 

HOWEVER - I can't thank you enough - the uv bit is genius - I know it's not clicking on a windows installer... but it has restored Leo to my MacOs computing world and that is worth many, many thanks. 

hwyl fawr from sunny Wales.

Israel Hands