Adding to Bryan's answer, if you simply want to compile a file or a bunch of files from a terminal, the py_compile module can be executed as a script in the following manner:

python -m py_compile fileA.py fileB.py fileC.py ...

The py_compile module provides a function to generate a byte-code file from a source file, and another function used when the module source file is invoked as a script.

python -m py_compile fileA.py fileB.py fileC.py

I think it's impossible to specify named arguments with -m option. If -m is necessary, you can create a wrapper that runs py_compile and pass arguments with sys.argv.

$ cat compile_it.py

import sys
import py_compile
# cfile` is named argument for destination filename
py_compile.compile(sys.argv[1],  cfile=sys.argv[2])

And use it with: python -m compile_it abc.py /Users/documents/abc.pyc

Or without -m: python compile_it.py abc.py /Users/documents/abc.pyc

I think Compiling Python Code would be a good place to start:

Python source code is automatically compiled into Python byte code by the CPython interpreter. Compiled code is usually stored in PYC (or PYO) files, and is regenerated when the source is updated, or when otherwise necessary.

To distribute a program to people who already have Python installed, you can ship either the PY files or the PYC files. In recent versions, you can also create a ZIP archive containing PY or PYC files, and use a small “bootstrap script” to add that ZIP archive to the path.

To “compile” a Python program into an executable, use a bundling tool, such as Gordon McMillan’s installer (alternative download) (cross-platform), Thomas Heller’s py2exe (Windows), Anthony Tuininga’s cx_Freeze (cross-platform), or Bob Ippolito’s py2app (Mac). These tools puts your modules and data files in some kind of archive file, and creates an executable that automatically sets things up so that modules are imported from that archive. Some tools can embed the archive in the executable itself.

You need to add a Shebang at the first line of your file like this:

#!/usr/bin/env python

and make your file executable by typing (in a terminal):

chmod u+x my_file.py

Just put this in the first line of your script :

#!/usr/bin/env python

Make the file executable with

chmod +x myfile.py

Execute with

./myfile.py

cx_Freeze is a cross-platform way to "freeze" a Python script into standalone binary form. According to their site:

cx_Freeze is a set of scripts and modules for freezing Python scripts into executables in much the same way that py2exe and py2app do. Unlike these two tools, cx_Freeze is cross platform and should work on any platform that Python itself works on. It requires Python 2.3 or higher since it makes use of the zip import facility which was introduced in that version.