Yes, I agree that firedrake is installed and can work, but it seems to be using my homebrew version of python, not the firedrake version. To answer the two questions: ** Question 1 ** regular am-laptop24:software fpoulin$ alias | grep python alias ipython='/usr/local/bin/ipython' alias python='/usr/local/bin/python' virtualenv (firedrake)am-laptop24:software fpoulin$ alias | grep python alias ipython='/usr/local/bin/ipython' alias pydoc='python -m pydoc' alias python='/usr/local/bin/python' alias pythonana='/Applications/anaconda/bin/python' ** Question 2 ** regular am-laptop24:software fpoulin$ type python python is aliased to `/usr/local/bin/python' virtualenv (firedrake)am-laptop24:software fpoulin$ type python python is aliased to `/usr/local/bin/python' ** Testing 3 different pythons **