[another arg..I sent this off to Greg Ward alone instead of to the mailing list. Here it is for everybody else :)]
Greg Ward wrote: [a whole slew of options on command line options]
Anyone have any other schemes? Comments on these? Preferences?
What about combining it with a options(.py?) file?
setup.py would simply implement a number of major options, like:
# install everything (default: standard dirs) (build if necessary?) setup install # build everything (default: for this platform) setup build # build docs setup build_docs # install docs setup install_docs
This would do everything in the default way. Especially installation (for which distutils will be used a lot anyway) will benefit from this, as it's simple. No need for most people to even think about options.
Then we have a simple options file, text, or perhaps better python, copiously commented:
# build what kind of docs docs_output = ['html', 'txt']
# install Python files to this directory install_dir = '/usr/local/lib/python1.5'
The idea of an options file is:
* It has comments. You don't need to remember a whole slew of command line options or read through an INSTALL document to see what command line options there are in the first place.
* You can have a site default options file (in combo with a package specific options file?). That way you don't have to command line option each package if you want to install it to a 'strange' directory, or whatever.
* Perhaps it's also easier to understand for non Unix Pythoneers, who aren't used to command line options.
Regards,
Martijn