Installing only python-core to a minimal system, e.g. build core-image-minimal and add this line to local.conf CORE_IMAGE_EXTRA_INSTALL = "python-core" will create a broken python installation. Running this image: $ runqemu qemuarm core-image-minimal serial ... Yocto (Built by Poky 6.0) 1.1+snapshot-20120324 qemuarm ttyAMA0 qemuarm login: root root@qemuarm:~# python Traceback (most recent call last): File "/usr/lib/python2.7/site.py", line 64, in <module> import traceback ImportError: No module named traceback I have a proposed solution already sent to oe-core as http://lists.linuxtogo.org/pipermail/openembedded-core/2012-March/019904.html
Fixed in master with: http://git.yoctoproject.org/cgit.cgi/poky/commit/?id=4a0720fd32ec5f5f76e6c8e859af1d7364bec23d thanks to a patch from Gary.