pyi-autobundle

Automatic hook and data file bundler for PyInstaller — a tool to help generate hooks, collect package assets, and produce PyInstaller spec files automatically so you can build portable binaries with a single command.

Key Features

• Static AST import scanning and basic dynamic import detection.
• Optional runtime import tracing to capture imports that only appear at runtime.
• Package inspection to collect datas (images, JSON, templates, ML models) and native binaries.
• Automatic generation of PyInstaller hook-*.py files and a working .spec file.
• One-command CLI: pybundle (entrypoint: pyi_autobundle.cli:main).
• Centralized configuration via pyproject.toml under [tool.pyi-autobundle].
• .buildignore support to exclude files, directories, or patterns from inclusion.
• Built-in hidden-imports database for common problematic packages (numpy, pandas, torch, PIL).
• --dry-run mode to audit what would be included without building.

Installation

Install in editable/development mode or as a package in your Python environment:

python -m pip install -e .
python -m pip install pyinstaller

CLI Usage

Basic one-command build:

pybundle path\to\main.py --trace

Common flags:

• --trace : run the runtime import tracer in addition to static scanning
• --onefile : build a single-file executable (PyInstaller --onefile)
• --windowed : create a windowed app (no console)
• --hooks-dir : directory to write generated hooks (default: .pyi-hooks)
• --buildignore : path to a .buildignore file to exclude assets
• --dry-run : list files/modules that would be included and exit

Configuration (pyproject.toml)

You can set default build options in pyproject.toml under the tool.pyi-autobundle table. Example:

[tool.pyi-autobundle]
onefile = true
windowed = false
name = "myapp"
icon = "assets/app.ico"

The CLI will merge values from this config with any flags you pass on the command line.

.buildignore

Place a .buildignore file in your project root to exclude files or patterns from being collected. Lines starting with # are treated as comments. Example:

# exclude tests and dataset
tests/
data/raw/
*.log

Resource discovery

If your code uses a helper like get_resource_path("assets/icon.png"), the static scanner attempts to detect literal calls and automatically include referenced files in the build.

Dry-run audit

Use --dry-run to print a report of datas, binaries, and hiddenimports that would be included by the build process without invoking PyInstaller.