[Python-Dev] Kill FCNTL.py

[Tim Peters]

Can we get rid of Lib/FCNTL.py for 2.4?  AFAICT, its existence does nothing
but create obscure problems for Windows users.  For an old example, in
tempfile.py:

try:
    import fcntl as _fcntl
    # If PYTHONCASEOK is set on Windows, stinking FCNTL.py gets
    # imported, and we don't get an ImportError then.  Provoke
    # an AttributeError instead in that case.
    _fcntl.fcntl
except (ImportError, AttributeError):


For an example from yesterday:

    http://mail.zope.org/pipermail/zope-dev/2004-July/023463.html

I don't know all the ways this happens, but a surprising number of Windows
users end up with a file named:

    fcntl.pyc

in their Lib directories, and then tons of things break, because imports of
fcntl pick that up instead of getting the ImportError cross-platform code
expects on Windows.

I know that one persistent user traced this to one of the Python-aware
installer-builders creating allupper.pyc files from ALLUPPER.py files on
Windows, but it's not worth the effort of tracking this down:  since the day
it was introduced, FCNTL.py has generated a deprecation warning telling you
to use fcntl instead.  The builtin fcntl was introduced in 1.5a3.  Enough
already <wink>.