https://github.com/python/cpython/commit/598e15d4feaee3849a91d92c9ca51f17baa... commit: 598e15d4feaee3849a91d92c9ca51f17baafe19c branch: master author: jdemeyer <J.Demeyer@UGent.be> committer: Antoine Pitrou <pitrou@free.fr> date: 2019-01-30T16:49:39+01:00 summary: bpo-25592: Improve documentation of distutils data_files (GH-9767) files: M Doc/distutils/setupscript.rst diff --git a/Doc/distutils/setupscript.rst b/Doc/distutils/setupscript.rst index c1051d2e807e..54ed1aebc242 100644 --- a/Doc/distutils/setupscript.rst +++ b/Doc/distutils/setupscript.rst @@ -524,20 +524,23 @@ following way:: setup(..., data_files=[('bitmaps', ['bm/b1.gif', 'bm/b2.gif']), ('config', ['cfg/data.cfg']), - ('/etc/init.d', ['init-script'])] ) -Note that you can specify the directory names where the data files will be -installed, but you cannot rename the data files themselves. - Each (*directory*, *files*) pair in the sequence specifies the installation -directory and the files to install there. If *directory* is a relative path, it -is interpreted relative to the installation prefix (Python's ``sys.prefix`` for -pure-Python packages, ``sys.exec_prefix`` for packages that contain extension -modules). Each file name in *files* is interpreted relative to the -:file:`setup.py` script at the top of the package source distribution. No -directory information from *files* is used to determine the final location of -the installed file; only the name of the file is used. +directory and the files to install there. + +Each file name in *files* is interpreted relative to the :file:`setup.py` +script at the top of the package source distribution. Note that you can +specify the directory where the data files will be installed, but you cannot +rename the data files themselves. + +The *directory* should be a relative path. It is interpreted relative to the +installation prefix (Python's ``sys.prefix`` for system installations; +``site.USER_BASE`` for user installations). Distutils allows *directory* to be +an absolute installation path, but this is discouraged since it is +incompatible with the wheel packaging format. No directory information from +*files* is used to determine the final location of the installed file; only +the name of the file is used. You can specify the ``data_files`` options as a simple sequence of files without specifying a target directory, but this is not recommended, and the