Required system packages

Python virtualenv

This is usually named something like python-virtualenv in linux distributions, and it is often installed by default. You could just try something like virtualenv --help and see if it is installed.

PostgresSQL (or another database supported by Django)

We recommend PostgreSQL for production. You can use any database supported by Django, but we do not recommend MySQL because PostgreSQL is far better with an at least as open license, especially when it comes to transaction management (which is important when you have to migrate your database between Devilry releases).

The default base buildout config (the one you extend in your buildout.cfg) has the Python postgresql library, psycopg2 configured as a dependency. See the psycopg2 install-from-source docs for information about what you need to build it. NOTE: you do not have to build it (buildout does that in the next section), but you need to install the packages required for a source install (python development headers, libpg, C compiler, ...).

If you do not want to use PostgreSQL, you can disable it by adding the following to the [buildout]-section of your buildout.cfg:

eggs -= psycopg2