Installing SQLite 3.50.0 and Python 3.13.3 on a GoDaddy Shared Hosting Server
I needed SQLite 3.50.0 and Python 3.13.3 in my account on a GoDaddy shared hosting server. Here's how I compiled and installed them.
Introduction
I have been building a database and web tool for tracking the web crawlers that are indexing and scraping my websites at conradhalling.com and sphaerula.com. I am now hosting the Crawler Activity reporting tool on sphaerula.com, which is hosted by GoDaddy.
I have been developing the tool using SQLite 3.50.0 and Python 3.13.3 on my M4 Pro MacBook Pro. But the GoDaddy shared hosting server has SQLite 3.26.0 and Python 3.6.8 installed. These were too old for my requirements.
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$ ssh yxxxxxxxxxx9@sphaerula.com
$ /usr/bin/python3 --version
Python 3.6.8
$ /usr/bin/sqlite3 --version
3.26.0 2018-12-01 12:34:55 bf8c1b2b7a5960c282e543b9c293686dccff272512d08865f4600fb58238alt1
To support my web application, I needed to compile and install SQLite 3.50.0 and Python 3.13.3. GoDaddy kindly provides excellent directions for installing Python 3, How to install and configure Python on a hosted server. But when I followed those directions, I discovered that Python was not linked to SQLite 3, and I couldn’t import the sqlite3 package.
After five tries, I succeeded in installing SQLite 3.50.0 and Python 3.13.3. These were the steps I used.
Configure Environment Variables
In my experience, compiling and installing software in a Linux environment is a tricky and error-prone business. (I used to do this regularly at $JOB when I was working as a bioinformatics scientist before I retired.) It is necessary to initialize some environment variables to get different software installations to recognize one another. (I won’t go into the details here about why these environment variables are needed.)
I modified my .bash_profile file using the nano editor to add the following lines:
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# Configure the environment for compiling and installing software
# into ${HOME}/local:
export PATH=${HOME}/local/bin:${PATH}:${HOME}/bin
export PKG_CONFIG_PATH=${HOME}/local/lib/pkgconfig:${PKG_CONFIG_PATH}
export CFLAGS=-I${HOME}/local/include
export LDFLAGS=-"L${HOME}/local/lib -Wl,-rpath,${HOME}/local/lib"
I logged out and logged in again to my account on the shared hosting server to initialize these variables properly in my working environment.
Create the local Directory
I chose to install the software into a directory named local in my account. (The directions provided by GoDaddy install Python into a hidden directory named .local, but I preferred not to hide the directory.) I created the directory and used the nano editor to add the following line to my .bash_profile.
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$ mkdir local
$ nano .bash_profile
export PATH=${HOME}/local/bin:${PATH}:${HOME}/bin
I logged out and logged in again to my account to initialize the PATH variable properly in my working environment.
Install readline 8.2
The first time I compiled and installed SQLite 3, it wasn’t linked to the readline library, meaning I couldn’t efficiently recover previous SQLite3 commands by pressing the up arrow key on my keyboard. Consequently, these directions begin with installing readline 8.2.
I downloaded the tarball, uncompressed it, configured the build, compiled the software, and installed the software using the following commands:
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$ cd
$ wget http://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/readline.git/snapshot/readline-master.tar.gz
$ tar -xzf readline-master.tgz
$ cd readline-master
$ ./configure --prefix=${HOME}/local
$ make
$ make install
I cleaned up my home directory.
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$ cd
$ rm -rf readline-master
$ rm readline-master.tgz
Install SQLite 3.50.0
SQLite 3.50.0 provides directions, Compiling for Unix-like systems, for compiling and installing the software. I followed these fairly closely.
I downloaded the source code, extracted it, and built the software in a separate directory named bld as instructed. I compiled and installed SQLite 3.
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$ wget https://sqlite.org/2025/sqlite-autoconf-3500000.tar.gz
$ tar -xzf sqlite-autoconf-3500000.tar.gz
$ mkdir bld
$ cd bld
$ ./sqlite-autoconf-3500000 configure --help
$ ./sqlite-autoconf-3500000 configure --prefix=${HOME}/local
Checking libs for readline...-lreadline
Using readline flags: -I/home/yzocwkxqowf9/local/include -lreadline -lncurses
Line-editing support for the sqlite3 shell: readline
$ make
$ make install
I confirmed that the shell could find SQLite 3.50.0.
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$ cd
$ which sqlite3
~/local/bin/sqlite3
$ sqlite3 --version
3.50.0 2025-05-29 14:26:00 dfc790f998f450d9c35e3ba1c8c89c17466cb559f87b0239e4aab9d34e28f742 (64-bit)
I tested that SQLite 3 worked correctly by opening my database file, data/crawlers.sqlite3, and executing three commands.
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$ sqlite3 data/crawlers.sqlite3
SQLite version 3.50.0 2025-05-29 14:26:00
Enter ".help" for usage hints.
sqlite> .schema tbl_domain
CREATE TABLE tbl_domain
(
id INTEGER PRIMARY KEY,
name TEXT NOT NULL UNIQUE,
log_file_glob_pattern TEXT NOT NULL
) STRICT
;
sqlite> .mode columns
sqlite> select * from tbl_domain;
id name access_log_file_glob_pattern
-- ----------------- ----------------------------
1 conradhalling.com access.log.*.gz
2 sphaerula.com sphaerula.com-*.gz
I confirmed that I could recover a previous command by pressing the up arrow on my keyboard three times to recover the .schema tbl_domain command, which I executed again. I quit sqlite.
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sqlite> .schema tbl_domain
CREATE TABLE tbl_domain
(
id INTEGER PRIMARY KEY,
name TEXT NOT NULL UNIQUE,
log_file_glob_pattern TEXT NOT NULL
) STRICT
;
sqlite> .quit
I cleaned up my home directory.
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$ cd
$ rm -rf bld
$ rm -rf sqlite-autoconf-3500000
$ rm sqlite-autoconf-3500000.tar.gz
Install Python 3.13.3
I downloaded the source code and configured, compiled, and installed Python 3.13.3. I carefully checked the output from the ./configure utility to make sure SQLite3 was recognized for linking (as shown in the console output below).
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$ cd
$ wget https://www.python.org/ftp/python/3.13.3/Python-3.13.3.tgz
$ tar -xzf Python-3.13.3.tgz
$ cd Python-3.13.3
$ ./configure --help
$ ./configure --prefix=${HOME}/local
[output omitted]
checking for sqlite3 >= 3.15.2... yes
checking for sqlite3.h... yes
checking for sqlite3_bind_double in -lsqlite3... yes
checking for sqlite3_column_decltype in -lsqlite3... yes
checking for sqlite3_column_double in -lsqlite3... yes
checking for sqlite3_complete in -lsqlite3... yes
checking for sqlite3_progress_handler in -lsqlite3... yes
checking for sqlite3_result_double in -lsqlite3... yes
checking for sqlite3_set_authorizer in -lsqlite3... yes
checking for sqlite3_trace_v2 in -lsqlite3... yes
checking for sqlite3_value_double in -lsqlite3... yes
checking for sqlite3_load_extension in -lsqlite3... yes
checking for sqlite3_serialize in -lsqlite3... yes
[output omittd]
checking for stdlib extension module _sqlite3... yes
$ make
$ make install
I checked that the shell could find Python 3.13.3, that I could start Python 3.13.3, and that I could import and use the sqlite3 package.
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$ cd
$ which python3
~/local/bin/python3
$ python3 --version
Python 3.13.3
$ python3
Python 3.13.3 (main, Jun 2 2025, 18:56:45) [GCC 8.5.0 20210514 (Red Hat 8.5.0-26)] on linux
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> import sqlite3
>>> sqlite3.sqlite_version
'3.50.0'
>>> exit()
I cleaned up my home directory.
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$ cd
$ rm -rf Python-3.13.3
$ rm Python-3.13.3.tgz
Set Up a Virtual Environment
I used the venv module to create a virtual environment, ${HOME}/venv313, into which I could install external packages.
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$ cd
$ python3 -m venv venv313
Install Python Packages
I initialized the virtual environment and installed the packages I needed for the Crawler Activity tool.
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$ source ~/venv/bin/activate
$ pip install --upgrade pip
$ pip install python-dotenv legacy-cgi
$ pip list
Package Version
------------- -------
legacy-cgi 2.6.3
pip 25.1.1
python-dotenv 1.1.0
Set the #! Line of the CGI Script
CGI scripts that used Python 3.13.3 required a #! line with the correct path. The path was:
#!/home/yxxxxxxxxxx9/venv313/bin/python3
Starting the CGI script with this #! path meant Python could find the external packages installed in the virtual environment.