Tim Peters wrote:
[James C. Ahlstrom]
Very interesting. I didn't know that. Probably neither does the average Windows developer.
They don't need to know it. I was explaining an extreme. ... Again explaining an extreme.
Yes, understood. Extremes are good for sharpening issues.
I think we may be kidding ourselves. It is not a matter of "prefer".
Sure it is. DevStudio also has a menu entry to generate a makefile (of MS's odd nmake flavor). I often set up personal projects using DevStudio, and then switch to a generated makefile so I can run overnight builds and tests from .bat scripts.
Yes, we write the makefiles by hand so we can build from Korn shell scripts. Microsoft's eccentric nmake format is a constant annoyance. But mostly Windows people stay in DevStudio.
And to top it off, you need on-line documentation for Windows anyway, so you need DevStudio or equivalant even if you do learn Distutils.
Sorry, but I don't understand where this is coming from.
It means that even if I need a Unix build too, I usually develop in DevStudio because of the on-line help. But for small projects, I develop on Linux because of the large setup annoyance of DevStudio. In other words, I have a poor memory and like built-in help.
As a WindowsPython Guy, I have one of five scenarios in mind for "distribution":
This is very useful because you have extended the discussion from just compiling to distributing.
1) The audience is purely Windows developers... 2) The audience is purely Windows end users... 3) The audience is Python programmers "in general"... 4) The audience is Python end-users "in general"... 5) The audience is Python end-users "in general"...
Others have commented at length. Suffice it to say I agree.
Distutils makes sense on Unix where things are done with makefiles. Why do we even care if Windows developers make Python extensions in DevStudio?
I don't care at all, provided they have no interest in sharing their work with non-Windows people. If they do want to share, they need to do more work (their Windows binaries aren't going to run on a SPARC <wink>), and Distutils can help with that.
Yes, this is the most common case where DistUtils can help in program development (as opposed to distribution). If only it were a more common case! JimA