Including files in source distributions with MANIFEST.in

When building a source distribution for your package, by default only a minimal set of files are included.

How files are included in an sdist

• all Python source files implied by the py_modules and packages setup() arguments

• all C source files mentioned in the ext_modules or libraries setup() arguments

• scripts specified by the scripts setup() argument

• all files specified by the package_data and data_files setup() arguments

• the file specified by the license_file option in setup.cfg (setuptools 40.8.0+)

• all files specified by the license_files option in setup.cfg (setuptools 42.0.0+)

• all files matching the pattern test/test*.py

• setup.py (or whatever you called your setup script)

• setup.cfg

• README

• README.txt

• README.rst (Python 3.7+ or setuptools 0.6.27+)

• README.md (setuptools 36.4.0+)

• pyproject.toml (setuptools 43.0.0+)

• MANIFEST.in

After processing the MANIFEST.in file, setuptools removes the build/ directory as well as any directories named RCS, CVS, or .svn from the sdist, and it adds a *PKG-INFO file and an .egg-info directory.