diff --git a/.gitignore b/.gitignore
index 04b7ce2..df1aa4b 100644
--- a/.gitignore
+++ b/.gitignore
@@ -47,4 +47,6 @@ fabric.properties
 
 # Don't include the full snapshot ZIP since it's massive.
 kiva_ds_json.zip
-*.json
\ No newline at end of file
+*.json
+spark-*/
+*.swp
diff --git a/requirements.txt b/requirements.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8c10745
--- /dev/null
+++ b/requirements.txt
@@ -0,0 +1 @@
+py4j>=0.10.4
diff --git a/start_pyspark.sh b/start_pyspark.sh
new file mode 100755
index 0000000..dd8e2d8
--- /dev/null
+++ b/start_pyspark.sh
@@ -0,0 +1,9 @@
+SPARK_DIR="spark-2.0.1-bin-hadoop2.7"
+SPARK_URL="http://apache.claz.org/spark/spark-2.0.1/spark-2.0.1-bin-hadoop2.7.tgz"
+
+if [ ! -d "$SPARK_DIR" ]; then
+    echo "Downloading Spark distribution..."
+    wget "$SPARK_URL" -O - | tar xzf -
+fi
+
+PYSPARK_DRIVER_PYTHON="jupyter" PYSPARK_DRIVER_PYTHON_OPTS="notebook" "./$SPARK_DIR/bin/pyspark"