title: Installing nltk for Python 3.4 on Mac OS 10.9
body: <p>I have been attempting to get nltk running under python 3.4 without success. Using the instructions at <a href="http://www.nltk.org/install.html" rel="noreferrer">http://www.nltk.org/install.html</a>:</p>
  
  <p>sudo pip install -U nltk</p>
  
  <p>This works for 2.7 that is preinstalled on the Mac, however when using</p>
  
  <p>sudo pip3 install -U nltk</p>
  
  <p>to try and install under 3.4 I get the following error:</p>
  
  <pre><code>    /usr/local/Cellar/python3/3.4.1_1/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/3.4/lib/python3.4/distutils/dist.py:260: UserWarning: Unknown distribution option: 'zip_safe'
  
    warnings.warn(msg)
  
  /usr/local/Cellar/python3/3.4.1_1/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/3.4/lib/python3.4/distutils/dist.py:260: UserWarning: Unknown distribution option: 'test_suite'
  
    warnings.warn(msg)
  
  /usr/local/Cellar/python3/3.4.1_1/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/3.4/lib/python3.4/distutils/dist.py:260: UserWarning: Unknown distribution option: 'entry_points'
  
    warnings.warn(msg)
  
  usage: setup.py [global_opts] cmd1 [cmd1_opts] [cmd2 [cmd2_opts] ...]
  
     or: setup.py --help [cmd1 cmd2 ...]
  
     or: setup.py --help-commands
  
     or: setup.py cmd --help
  
  
  
  error: invalid command 'bdist_egg'
  
  /private/tmp/pip_build_root/nltk/distribute-0.6.21-py3.4.egg
  
  Traceback (most recent call last):
  
    File "/private/tmp/pip_build_root/nltk/distribute_setup.py", line 143, in use_setuptools
  
      raise ImportError
  
  ImportError
  
  
  
  During handling of the above exception, another exception occurred:
  
  
  
  Traceback (most recent call last):
  
    File "&lt;string&gt;", line 17, in &lt;module&gt;
  
    File "/private/tmp/pip_build_root/nltk/setup.py", line 23, in &lt;module&gt;
  
      distribute_setup.use_setuptools()
  
    File "/private/tmp/pip_build_root/nltk/distribute_setup.py", line 145, in use_setuptools
  
      return _do_download(version, download_base, to_dir, download_delay)
  
    File "/private/tmp/pip_build_root/nltk/distribute_setup.py", line 125, in _do_download
  
      _build_egg(egg, tarball, to_dir)
  
    File "/private/tmp/pip_build_root/nltk/distribute_setup.py", line 116, in _build_egg
  
      raise IOError('Could not build the egg.')
  
  OSError: Could not build the egg.
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Python 3.4 was installed with brew and both bumpy and setuptools are installed correctly. I have seen hints of this problem through some goggling but no definitive answers.</p>