frigobar 5

Distribute Python scripts to Windows machines without freezing them.

Frigobar

Distribute Python scripts to Windows machines without freezing them.

Basic usage

frigobar my_script.py

This will create a frigobar folder, with a my_script.bat file in it. Run it to run your app.

Installation

pip install frigobar

Options

> frigobar --help
usage: cli.py [-h] [-r REQUIREMENTS_FILE] [-p PYTHON_VERSION] [-t TIMESTAMP] [--copy-directory] script-path [target-directory]

Distribute Python scripts to Windows machines without freezing them. The resulting distribution will be put in a folder that can be copied to any Windows machine. Users should run "<script_name>.bat" to run the
script. All the dependencies, including a standalone build of Python, will be downloaded on the first run.

positional arguments:
  script-path           Path to the script to distribute.
  target-directory      Folder where the distribution will be put. Defaults to 'frigobar'.

options:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  -r REQUIREMENTS_FILE, --requirements-file REQUIREMENTS_FILE
                        Path to a requirements file that lists the dependencies of the script. Defaults to'requirements.txt'.
  -p PYTHON_VERSION, --python-version PYTHON_VERSION, --python PYTHON_VERSION
                        Python version, in X.Y.Z format, that the distribution should use. The version must be available on https://github.com/astral-sh/python-build-standalone/releases. Defaults to 3.13.11.
  -t TIMESTAMP, --timestamp TIMESTAMP
                        Release timestamp (YYYYMMDD format) for the Python build. Check https://github.com/astral-sh/python-build-standalone/releases for available dates. Defaults to 20251205.
  --copy-directory      Copy the contents of the script directory to the distribution.

Rationale

A common technique to distribute Python apps is to "freeze" them using tools like PyInstaller or cx_Freeze. These freezers create a standalone executable that contains your app and all its dependencies. This is a workable solution, but it has two main drawbacks:

1. The resulting frozen app is often huge. It's not uncommon to see a simple app taking MBs of space.
2. Because dependence resolution is hard, the frozen app may contain more or less dependencies than it needs. Less dependencies lead to dread "working-app-that-stop-working-when-you-freeze-it" situations. Unnecessary dependencies lead to bloated apps.

Frigobar avoids those problems by postponing the download of the Python interpreter and all the app's dependencies to the first time the user runs the app, making the app the smallest it can be. Frigobar also doesn't try to be smart about dependencies and will only download the ones explicitly listed in a requirements.txt file. This a closer experience to what a developer does when he runs the app in his own machine, which hopefully will lead to less surprises to users.