On Fri, Dec 6, 2013 at 4:33 AM, Nick Coghlan <ncoghlan@gmail.com> wrote:
In the absence of the perfect solution (i.e. picking the right variant out of no SSE, SSE2, SSE3 automatically), would it be a reasonable compromise to standardise on SSE2 as "lowest acceptable common denominator"?
+1
Users with no sse capability at all or that wanted to take advantage of the SSE3 optimisations, would need to grab one of the Windows installers or something from conda, but for a lot of users, a "pip install numpy" that dropped the SSE2 version onto their system would be just fine, and a much lower barrier to entry than "well, first install this other packaging system that doesn't interoperate with your OS package manager at all...".
exactly -- for example, I work with a web dev that could really use Matplotlib for a little task -- if I could tell him to "pip install matplotlib", he's do it, but he just sees it as too much hassle at the point...
Are we letting perfect be the enemy of better, here?
I think so, yes. -Chris -- Christopher Barker, Ph.D. Oceanographer Emergency Response Division NOAA/NOS/OR&R (206) 526-6959 voice 7600 Sand Point Way NE (206) 526-6329 fax Seattle, WA 98115 (206) 526-6317 main reception Chris.Barker@noaa.gov