On 24 February 2017 at 00:28, Paul Moore <p.f.moore@gmail.com> wrote:
Specifically, I doubt people will make a firm distinction between
"tool" and "library". In many cases it'll be a matter of opinion. Is
py.test a tool or a library? It has a command line interface after
all. I'd also drop "used to develop and deploy Python libraries,
applications, and scripts" - why does what it's used for affect its
category? I can think of examples I think of as "tools" that are
general purpose (e.g. youtube-dl) but I'd expect you to claim they are
"applications". But unless they pin their dependencies (which
youtube-dl doesn't AFAIK) the distinction is irrelevant. So I prefer
to leave it to the author to decide, rather than force an artificial
split.

The difference is that:

* tool = you typically want at least one copy per Python interpreter (like a library)
* application = you typically only want one copy per system

It may be clearer to make the former category "devtool", since it really is specific to tools that are coupled to the task of Python development.

Cheers,
Nick.

--
Nick Coghlan   |   ncoghlan@gmail.com   |   Brisbane, Australia