RTD build fails with TypeError: canonicalize_version() got an unexpected keyword argument 'strip_trailing_zero'

[toni-sissala]

This failure happens during installing of requirements.txt. It occurs because pip 24 uses deprecated setuptools command "python setup.py develop" under the hood when installing packages as editable and when wheel is installed in same environment. RTD uses virtualenv package to create the python virtual environment that is used to build the docs, and that package installs wheel also. There is a conflict in dependencies with setuptools-package and packaging-package, and the build fails.

Pip 24 can be instructed to use "modern mechanism for editable installs" by adding --use-pep517 flag to the install command. In RTD this can be achieved by customizing the pre-build step. Note, that --use-pep517 will become the default from pip 25 onwards.

Some links with additional info:

• Deprecate pip install --editable calling setup.py develop pypa/pip#11457
• Replace easy_install with pip install pypa/setuptools#917
• [BUG] TypeError: canonicalize_version() got an unexpected keyword argument 'strip_trailing_zero' pypa/setuptools#4483