MATLAB: Python is not loaded for an engine mode MATLAB session

MATLABmatlab engine api for pythonpythonpython api

I'm starting MATLAB from a Python script by using the following commands:
import matlab.engine
eng = matlab.engine.start_matlab() # get MATLAB
eng.desktop(nargout=0)  # interactive MATLAB session
However, the started MATLAB session doesn't recognize Python commands. For example, pyversion returns
       version: ''
    executable: ''
       library: ''
          home: ''
      isloaded: 0
When MATLAB is started 'normally' (e.g. via its desktop shortcut), pyversion gives a meaningful output and it is possible to run Pythin commands in MATLAB.
The motivation to use Python in the MATLAB session started from Python is to convert the MATLAB output results to Python datatypes via py.list and similar commands. I.e. I don't want to get something like matlab.double back to Python.
While it is possible to circumvent this issue by smartly converting the MATLAB output to cells and then merging the resulting lists in Python, it would be interesting to clarify why Python is not accessible inside MATLAB in this particular case.
I'm trying to pass an n-by-2 matrix from MATLAB as a list of 2-tuples to Python (i.e. each matrix row should become a 2-tuple). Currently I'm doing the following:
col1 = num2cell(uint32(matr(:, 1)), 2);
col2 = num2cell(uint32(matr(:, 2)), 2);
And then in Python (cols is the output of the MATLAB function retrieved in Python):
col1 = cols[0]
col2 = cols[1]
lst = list(zip(col1, col2 ))

Best Answer

Does this help?
import sys
eng.pyversion(sys.executable, nargout=0)
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