prints the install path of a given Python package

which.py

#!/usr/bin/env python
# -*- coding: utf-8 -*-
# Author: Arne Neumann
#
# Purpose: prints the path where the given Python package is installed.
# This might be interesting if you're working with multiple environments
# and are unsure if/where a package was installed.

import os
import sys

def which(package):
    try:
        exec("import {}".format(package))
    except ImportError as e:
        return "{}. Did you install {} in this environment?".format(e, package)
    try:
        return os.path.abspath(os.path.dirname(eval(package).__file__))
    except AttributeError as e:
         return "{}. {} is probably a built-in module.".format(e, package)


if __name__ == '__main__':
    if len(sys.argv) >= 2:
        for i, package in enumerate(sys.argv[1:], 1):
            print which(sys.argv[i])
    else:
        print "{} prints the path where the given Python packages are installed.".format(sys.argv[0])
        print "{} PYTHON_PACKAGE_NAME".format(sys.argv[0])
        sys.exit(1)

TODO: sanitize input (e.g. validate that package is a valid package name
and not the Python equivalent of ;DROP TABLE)

There's prior art:

pwhich 0.1.0 6 Python which - find out where Python modules are located on your drive
pywhich 1.1.1 5 Find where python modules are installed.
whichpkg 0.4.0 5 Locate the path of a specific python module

Also see http://stackoverflow.com/questions/247770/retrieving-python-module-path/12154601#12154601