Equivalent for `--find-links` in `setup.py`

Question

What is the equivalent of --find-links / -f flag for pip in setup.py.

I know dependency_links exist,

Answer 1

In a setuptools context the dependency_links option should do what you need. According to setuptools documentation, this option accepts:

the URLs of web pages that contain direct download links

for example:

setuptools.setup(
    # ...
    dependency_links=[
        "http://peak.telecommunity.com/snapshots/",
    ],
)

Important note regarding pip:

Since its version 19.0, released on 2019-01-22, pip ignores the setuptools options dependency_links. The solution in a pip context is to use one of the pip install options --index-url, --extra-index-url, or --find-links.

The rationale behind the decision for pip to drop the support of setuptools dependency_links is (in very short): pip should only download from PyPI unless the user themselves explicitly takes the responsibility to allow downloads from alternatives sources by using one of these previously mentioned options. More details can be found for example in this discussion.