README install instructions for Jupyter lab are unclear

[willeppy]

Hi,

Description

I installed this cookie cutter onto my local machine and was following the README to set up for Jupyter lab, however ran into some issues.

When I run bashpip install -e . it executes successfully and installs. However, when I run jupyter labextension develop BasicWidget I get the following error.

Installing /Users/wepperso/Documents/Research/Projects/Notebook_Vis_Rec_Projects/BasicWidget/BasicWidget/labextension -> BasicWidget
An error occured.
ValueError: /Users/wepperso/opt/anaconda3/envs/jupTest/share/jupyter/labextensions/BasicWidget exists and is not a symlink
See the log file for details:  /var/folders/zg/pzhsf9sj45qcbpm46g7m_gf80000gp/T/jupyterlab-debug-i408sjj9.log

The widget still seems to work however. My question is what does the jupyter labextension develop command do? In order to get changes in the js/ folder to show up I have to re-run pip install -e . so I assume it might help with this.

Note: I did not run the install instructions for Jupyter notebook beforehand, only for lab. Is this necessary for the lab install to work?

OS

• macOS Big Sur 11.1
• Python 3.9.1
• Jupyter lab 3.0.7
• Jupyter notebook 6.2.0

[jasongrout]

Don't forget the --overwrite mentioned in the readme. It's complaining that there is something already there (indeed, installed by the pip install command), which it will need to overwrite with the symlink.

jupyter labextension develop --overwrite BasicWidget

[willeppy]

Got it, this worked thanks! I didn't see the --overwrite mentioned in the README currently so opened a PR to update

89

[jasongrout]

I didn't see the --overwrite mentioned in the README currently so opened a PR to update

Ah, I was looking in the generated readme in the project, which does mention the --overwrite flag. Thanks for the update to the top-level readme!