title: Removing and reinstalling Python-Sphinx on Windows
body: <p>I am trying to use Python (3.8) and Sphinx (3.3.1) to build a documentation in HTML. However, the <code>sphinx-build</code> command gives me the following error:</p>
  <pre><code>C:\Users\Me\Dropbox\Kuchen&gt;sphinx-build -b html source build
  Running Sphinx v3.3.1
  loading pickled environment... done
  building [mo]: targets for 0 po files that are out of date
  building [html]: targets for 1 source files that are out of date
  updating environment: 0 added, 1 changed, 0 removed
  reading sources... [100%] kaesekuchen
  looking for now-outdated files... none found
  pickling environment... done
  checking consistency... done
  preparing documents... done
  writing output... [100%] kaesekuchen
  generating indices... genindex done
  writing additional pages... search done
  copying static files... WARNING: Failed to copy a file in html_static_file: c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages\sphinx\themes\basic\static/jquery-3.5.1.js: PermissionError(13, 'Permission denied')
  WARNING: Failed to copy a file in html_static_file: c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages\sphinx\themes\basic\static/jquery.js: PermissionError(13, 'Permission denied')
  done
  copying extra files... done
  dumping search index in English (code: en)... done
  dumping object inventory... done
  build succeeded, 2 warnings.
  </code></pre>
  <p>However,</p>
  <ol>
  <li>The HTML file <code>kaesekuchen</code> in <code>build</code> is not updated/changed.</li>
  <li>The folder <code>c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages\sphinx</code> does not exist.</li>
  </ol>
  <p>The latter is my fault, because I deleted it in file explorer, but only because I encountered the exact same error before, and hoped that deleting and re-installing <code>Sphinx</code> would solve it.</p>
  <p>Instead, the commands <code>pip uninstall sphinx</code> and subsequent <code>pip install -U sphinx</code> do not change anything in that folder, and the latter only gives the following upbeat output despite the following output:</p>
  <pre><code>Microsoft Windows [Version 10.0.18363.1198]
  (c) 2019 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
  
  C:\Users\me&gt;pip uninstall sphinx
  Found existing installation: Sphinx 3.3.1
  Uninstalling Sphinx-3.3.1:
    Would remove:
      c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages\sphinx-3.3.1.dist-info\*
      c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages\sphinx\*
      c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\scripts\sphinx-apidoc.exe
      c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\scripts\sphinx-autogen.exe
      c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\scripts\sphinx-build.exe
      c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\scripts\sphinx-quickstart.exe
  Proceed (y/n)? y
    Successfully uninstalled Sphinx-3.3.1
  
  C:\Users\me&gt;pip install -U sphinx
  Collecting sphinx
    Using cached Sphinx-3.3.1-py3-none-any.whl (2.9 MB)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: docutils&gt;=0.12 in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from sphinx) (0.16)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: sphinxcontrib-serializinghtml in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from sphinx) (1.1.4)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: snowballstemmer&gt;=1.1 in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from sphinx) (2.0.0)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: alabaster&lt;0.8,&gt;=0.7 in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from sphinx) (0.7.12)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: setuptools in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from sphinx) (41.2.0)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: colorama&gt;=0.3.5; sys_platform == &quot;win32&quot; in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from sphinx) (0.4.4)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: sphinxcontrib-jsmath in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from sphinx) (1.0.1)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: babel&gt;=1.3 in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from sphinx) (2.9.0)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: imagesize in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from sphinx) (1.2.0)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: sphinxcontrib-devhelp in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from sphinx) (1.0.2)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: sphinxcontrib-qthelp in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from sphinx) (1.0.3)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: Jinja2&gt;=2.3 in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from sphinx) (2.11.2)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: sphinxcontrib-applehelp in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from sphinx) (1.0.2)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: requests&gt;=2.5.0 in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from sphinx) (2.25.0)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: packaging in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from sphinx) (20.4)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: sphinxcontrib-htmlhelp in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from sphinx) (1.0.3)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: Pygments&gt;=2.0 in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from sphinx) (2.7.2)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: pytz&gt;=2015.7 in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from babel&gt;=1.3-&gt;sphinx) (2020.4)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: MarkupSafe&gt;=0.23 in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from Jinja2&gt;=2.3-&gt;sphinx) (1.1.1)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: urllib3&lt;1.27,&gt;=1.21.1 in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from requests&gt;=2.5.0-&gt;sphinx) (1.26.2)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: idna&lt;3,&gt;=2.5 in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from requests&gt;=2.5.0-&gt;sphinx) (2.10)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: certifi&gt;=2017.4.17 in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from requests&gt;=2.5.0-&gt;sphinx) (2020.11.8)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: chardet&lt;4,&gt;=3.0.2 in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from requests&gt;=2.5.0-&gt;sphinx) (3.0.4)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: six in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from packaging-&gt;sphinx) (1.15.0)
  Requirement already satisfied, skipping upgrade: pyparsing&gt;=2.0.2 in c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages (from packaging-&gt;sphinx) (2.4.7)
  Installing collected packages: sphinx
  Successfully installed sphinx-3.3.1
  </code></pre>
  <p>But the folder <code>c:\users\me\appdata\local\programs\python\python38\lib\site-packages\sphinx\</code> is still not there.</p>
  <p>I even tried to run a new Sphinx project from scratch, using <code>sphinx-quickstart</code>:</p>
  <pre><code>For a list of supported codes, see
  https://www.sphinx-doc.org/en/master/usage/configuration.html#confval-language.
  &gt; Project language [en]: en
  
  Creating file C:\Users\me\Dropbox\Kuchentest\source\conf.py.
  Creating file C:\Users\me\Dropbox\Kuchentest\source\index.rst.
  Creating file C:\Users\me\Dropbox\Kuchentest\Makefile.
  Creating file C:\Users\me\Dropbox\Kuchentest\make.bat.
  
  Finished: An initial directory structure has been created.
  
  You should now populate your master file C:\Users\me\Dropbox\Kuchentest\source\index.rst and create other documentation
  source files. Use the Makefile to build the docs, like so:
     make builder
  where &quot;builder&quot; is one of the supported builders, e.g. html, latex or linkcheck.
  </code></pre>
  <p>But despite this output, there are no such files or <code>source</code> folder being created.</p>
  <p>What can I do to cleanly reset my Sphinx installation and get my documentation to run again?</p>