Improving setuptools bootstrapping
So, I've been giving some thought to how setuptools does its bootstrap installation. One potentially-significant problem is that people are often installing older versions, because of old copies of ez_setup.py being distributed in people's packages. Right now, ez_setup.py is used for two purposes. First, you can include it in a source package in order to be able to use setuptools. Second, it's also used as a way of installing setuptools in a standalone setting. In both cases, there are two possibilities regarding the target machine: it may have network access, or it may not. If it does have access, the current approaches basically work okay, except for the versioning issue. If network access isn't available, however, it annoys users who are trying to install a setuptools-based package who don't already have setuptools. (Thus creating a bad impression for both setuptools *and* the package using it.) This isn't likely to remain a problem in the long term. As setuptools stabilizes, it will be more likely that the user already has a current and stable setuptools version installed. A later version of Python might even bundle it, and it's also relatively easy to create system packages of setuptools now. For example, I could go back to building .exe installers for Windows, and perhaps throw in Linux RPMs as well. (And perhaps get contributed Mac OS packages too.) Back when the current ez_setup.py system was created, this wasn't an option because system packages of eggs weren't well-supported, and version conflicts could occur if you tried to also install the egg version of something. But none of these things are issues any more. So it's possible that we could start phasing out ez_setup's automatic downloading, in favor of simply requesting that setuptools be installed first. The advantage is that ez_setup would become simpler and more stable, without version skew in its distributed versions. The disadvantage is that it requires an extra step to install, which might discourage user or developer adoption. But adoption appears to be quite widespread now; the Cheeseshop shows tens of thousands of downloads of setuptools 0.6c1 alone! So, perhaps we should move to doing something like this: when you run a setup.py that's using ez_setup(), and it appears necessary to download/install setuptools, a message is displayed, something like: ---------------------------------------------------------------- setuptools >= 0.6c1 not found Please install or upgrade the setuptools package before running this script; see http://cheeseshop.python.org/pypi/setuptools for downloads. ---------------------------------------------------------------- If there's a version of setuptools already on the machine, the message could also add something like this at the end: You may be able to upgrade your current installation of setuptools using 'easy_install -U setuptools'. This would reduce ez_setup.py to hardly any code at all. Pros: * Net-less installs are less painful * Users don't get surprised by "setup.py install" trying to access the net * No version skew or missing version issues * Users can install system packages (RPM, .exe, etc.) of setuptools Cons: * Manual step for new setuptools adopters (but who's left?) * Might break setuptools-wrapping programs (like zc.buildout and Enstaller) if they rely on ez_setup * Developers might not want to switch to this new approach, if they feel the manual step is unwieldy Does anybody have any thoughts on this, one way or the other?
Phillip, Regarding your concern about breaking setuptools-wrapping programs, don't worry about Enstaller. Yes, it does depend on the functionality that ez_setup.py currently provides at the moment, but the bootstrap code is easily changed to grab and install setuptools using other means (we have Enstaller handling eggs of everything from wxPython on Linux to MinGW on Windows, so I'm sure a change for something like this won't be a problem ;). We can have Enstaller default to finding the latest setuptools available if one isn't installed, or a specific version if the user requests it. A nice feature of Enstaller will be that another con you mentioned--the extra manual step for new setuptools adopters--also won't be an issue.
Date: Fri, 01 Sep 2006 19:35:16 -0400 From: "Phillip J. Eby" <pje@telecommunity.com>
So, I've been giving some thought to how setuptools does its bootstrap installation.
One potentially-significant problem is that people are often installing older versions, because of old copies of ez_setup.py being distributed in people's packages.
Right now, ez_setup.py is used for two purposes. First, you can include it in a source package in order to be able to use setuptools. Second, it's also used as a way of installing setuptools in a standalone setting.
In both cases, there are two possibilities regarding the target machine: it may have network access, or it may not. If it does have access, the current approaches basically work okay, except for the versioning issue. If network access isn't available, however, it annoys users who are trying to install a setuptools-based package who don't already have setuptools. (Thus creating a bad impression for both setuptools *and* the package using it.)
This isn't likely to remain a problem in the long term. As setuptools stabilizes, it will be more likely that the user already has a current and stable setuptools version installed. A later version of Python might even bundle it, and it's also relatively easy to create system packages of setuptools now.
For example, I could go back to building .exe installers for Windows, and perhaps throw in Linux RPMs as well. (And perhaps get contributed Mac OS packages too.) Back when the current ez_setup.py system was created, this wasn't an option because system packages of eggs weren't well-supported, and version conflicts could occur if you tried to also install the egg version of something. But none of these things are issues any more.
So it's possible that we could start phasing out ez_setup's automatic downloading, in favor of simply requesting that setuptools be installed first.
The advantage is that ez_setup would become simpler and more stable, without version skew in its distributed versions. The disadvantage is that it requires an extra step to install, which might discourage user or developer adoption.
But adoption appears to be quite widespread now; the Cheeseshop shows tens of thousands of downloads of setuptools 0.6c1 alone!
So, perhaps we should move to doing something like this: when you run a setup.py that's using ez_setup(), and it appears necessary to download/install setuptools, a message is displayed, something like:
---------------------------------------------------------------- setuptools >= 0.6c1 not found
Please install or upgrade the setuptools package before running this script; see http://cheeseshop.python.org/pypi/setuptools for downloads. ----------------------------------------------------------------
If there's a version of setuptools already on the machine, the message could also add something like this at the end:
You may be able to upgrade your current installation of setuptools using 'easy_install -U setuptools'.
This would reduce ez_setup.py to hardly any code at all.
Pros: * Net-less installs are less painful * Users don't get surprised by "setup.py install" trying to access the net * No version skew or missing version issues * Users can install system packages (RPM, .exe, etc.) of setuptools
Cons: * Manual step for new setuptools adopters (but who's left?) * Might break setuptools-wrapping programs (like zc.buildout and Enstaller) if they rely on ez_setup * Developers might not want to switch to this new approach, if they feel the manual step is unwieldy
Does anybody have any thoughts on this, one way or the other?
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-- Rick Ratzel - Enthought, Inc. 515 Congress Avenue, Suite 2100 - Austin, Texas 78701 512-536-1057 x229 - Fax: 512-536-1059 http://www.enthought.com
On Sep 1, 2006, at 7:35 PM, Phillip J. Eby wrote: ...
Right now, ez_setup.py is used for two purposes. First, you can include it in a source package in order to be able to use setuptools. Second, it's also used as a way of installing setuptools in a standalone setting. ... So, perhaps we should move to doing something like this: when you run a setup.py that's using ez_setup(), and it appears necessary to download/install setuptools, a message is displayed, something like:
....
This would reduce ez_setup.py to hardly any code at all.
Pros: * Net-less installs are less painful * Users don't get surprised by "setup.py install" trying to access the net * No version skew or missing version issues * Users can install system packages (RPM, .exe, etc.) of setuptools
Cons: * Manual step for new setuptools adopters (but who's left?) * Might break setuptools-wrapping programs (like zc.buildout and Enstaller) if they rely on ez_setup * Developers might not want to switch to this new approach, if they feel the manual step is unwieldy
Does anybody have any thoughts on this, one way or the other?
+1 However, this only addresses the first use case above. I still like ez_setup for the second use case. In particular, the zc.buildout bootstrap script lets ez_setup do most of it's work. It downloads a fresh copy of ez_setup and uses it to download setuptools and zc.buildout. Part of what makes this work is the fact that ez_setup has a well-known URL, so my bootstrap script, http://svn.zope.org/zc.buildout/trunk/bootstrap/bootstrap.py? view=auto can be pretty stupid and minimal. Of course, if ez_setup went away, I'd cope. :) Jim -- Jim Fulton mailto:jim@zope.com Python Powered! CTO (540) 361-1714 http://www.python.org Zope Corporation http://www.zope.com http://www.zope.org
participants (3)
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Jim Fulton -
Phillip J. Eby -
Rick Ratzel