In setuptools/command/easy_install.py, easy_install.write_script is the method called to install each of a package's scripts. It contains the following: f = open(target,"w"+mode) f.write(contents) f.close() chmod(target,0755) opening the file with "w" will cause it to truncate, and then there is a race between the open and the write. Further, due to buffering there is even no guarantee that a user will see either an empty or complete version of the script during this time. It should be safer to instead write to a temporary file and then use shutil.move, which, on Unix- like systems at least, will call rename() (i.e. what /bin/mv would do). renaming is atomic and allows the old version to remain in tact (anonymously) if any process had it open for reading, and also ensures that no process will see an incomplete version. The above code can also create problems in a multi-user environment. chmod() is inflexibly giving only the owner write access. The author may have purposely given the script (the original non-wrapper version, at least) group write access so that other developers could install newer versions of the package at a later time. The chmod() call blocks this attempt. More importantly, directory permissions are ignored. That is, even if the script itself is not writable (necessarily true with the current code), its parent directory may purposely be writable so that newer versions can be added. Using shutl.move will address this since it operates on the directory and not the file itself. This is arguable the correct semantics anyway: "install a new version of the script", not "edit the existing script".