My First Day Learning Quantitative Trading: Installing VnPy on Mac M1

Why I'm Writing This

I'm a recent graduate who decided to learn quantitative trading. This is Day 1 of my learning journey.

The Problem

I tried to install VnPy (a Python trading framework) on my Mac M1. It seemed simple, but...

First attempt:

python3 -c "import vnpy"

Error:

ModuleNotFoundError: No module named 'vnpy.trader'

I asked AI: "What does ModuleNotFoundError mean?" AI gave me answers, but none worked.

The Insight

The problem wasn't AI's answer. The problem was I didn't understand my own problem well enough.

AI can only help if you know what to ask.

The Solution

After debugging, I discovered: Mac had multiple Python versions!

• python3 → Python 3.9
• python → Python 3.13 (where VnPy was installed)

When I used the correct command:

python << 'EOF'
from vnpy.trader.engine import MainEngine
print("✅ VnPy installed successfully!")
EOF

Success! ✅

What I Learned

1. Problem-solving > tool usage
2. AI is powerful, but you need to be smarter
3. Keep learning in public

If you're also learning to code or trading,