[Python-Dev] debug and release python

[Kristján Valur Jónsson]

Hello there.
I'm sure this has come up before, but here it is again:

Python exports a different api in debug mode, depending on whether PYMALLOC_DEBUG and WITH_PYMALLOC are exported.  This means that _d.pyd files that are used must have been compiled with a version of python using the same settings for these macros.   It is unfortunate that the _PyObject_DebugMalloc() api is exposed to external applications using macros in objimpl.h

I would suggest two things:

1)      provide dummy or thunking versions of those in builds that don't have PYMALLOC_DEBUG impolemented, that thunk to PyObject_Malloc et al. (This is what we have done at CCP)

2)      Remove the _PyObject_DebugMalloc() from the api.  It really should be an implementation of in the exposed PyObject_Malloc() functions whether they use debug functionality at all.   the _PyObject_DebugCheckAddress and _PyObject_DebugDumpAddress() can be left in place.  But exposing this functionality in macros that external moduled compile in, is not good at all.


The reason why this is annoying:
Some external software comes with proprietary .pyd bindings.  When developing my own application, with modified preprocessor definitions (e.g. to turn off PYMALLOC_DEBUG) we find that those externally provided libraries don't work.  It takes a fair amount of detective work to find out why exactly linkage fails.  The external API really shouldn't change depending on preprocessor definitions.

Cheers,

K

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