In article <07Nov1.205537pst."57996"@synergy1.parc.xerox.com>, Bill Janssen <janssen@parc.com> wrote:

This is really interesting. For my apps, I use the system Python on Tiger, and expect to do it again with Leopard. If I have to have a specific version of an extension that's needed, I make sure the directory where I keep it is on the sys.path of my application before the standard directories. That seems to be about all that's required. I'm not sure what all the FUD about the system Python is...

For your own apps on your own machines, sure - you can manage the whole environment and the system Python should be fine (that is, if and until you need a newer build of Python itself). I think the "FUD" you refer to concerns a different problem: developing and distributing multiple-component Python apps to multiple users on multiple machines. Controlling all those environments isn't so easy. Deploying apps and components as eggs using setuptools is one way to simplify that problem; building standalone OSX apps with embedded stripped-down Python runtimes and components using py2app is another. -- Ned Deily, nad@acm.org