Installation

LitSync requires Python 3.10 or newer.

Quick install

The fastest way is with uv (recommended) or pip:

# Using uv
uv venv && source .venv/bin/activate
uv pip install -e ".[dev]"

# Using pip
python -m venv .venv && source .venv/bin/activate
pip install -e ".[dev]"

Or use the repository Makefile:

make install   # installs runtime requirements
make dev       # installs the package in editable mode

From PyPI:

pip install litsync

Dependencies

LitSync has a deliberately small dependency footprint:

Package	Purpose
requests	HTTP downloads with retries and resumable ranges.
rich	Progress bars, tables, and styled terminal output.

Optional extras

Extra	Purpose
dev	Development tools (pytest, ruff).
docs	Sphinx and theme packages for building this documentation.

Install extras together:

pip install -e ".[dev,docs]"

Configure environment

At minimum set a contact email — it is sent in the User-Agent header so the service operators can reach you if your mirror misbehaves:

export NCBI_EMAIL=you@example.org

You can also pass it per-run with --email.

Verify the install

litsync --help
litsync-extract --help

You should see the CLI help for both entry points.