Mailman 3 July 2004 - Python-Dev

Test breakage due to optparse
by Tim Peters 31 Jul '04

31 Jul '04

Heads up. Recent changes to optparse and/or to its test are causing several spurious test failures, Here's a minimal incantation to get the first new failure of this kind: C:\Code\python\PCbuild>python -E -tt ../lib/test/regrtest.py test_optparse test_pep277 test_optparse test_pep277 test test_pep277 produced unexpected output: ********************************************************************** *** lines 2-4 of actual output doesn't appear in expected output after line 1: + u'\xdf-\u66e8\u66e9\u66eb' + ['???', '???', '??????', '????????????', '????G\xdf', 'Ge??-sa?', 'Gr\xfc\xdf-Gott', 'abc', 'ascii'] + [u'Gr\xfc\xdf-Gott', u'abc', u'ascii', u'\u0393\u03b5\u03b9\u03ac-\u03c3\u03b1\u03c2', u'\u0417\u0434\u0440\u0430\u043 2\u0441\u0442\u0432\u0443\u0439\u0442\u0435', u'\u05d4\u05e9\u05e7\u05e6\u05e5\u05e1', u'\u306b\u307d\u3093', u'\u66e8\u 05e9\u3093\u0434\u0393\xdf', u'\u66e8\u66e9\u66eb'] ********************************************************************** 1 test OK. 1 test failed: test_pep277 In all, with a complete test run, there are 15 spurious test failures on Windows now: 15 tests failed: test_pep277 test_pkg test_popen test_popen2 test_profile test_pyexpat test_regex test_rgbimg test_rotor test_scope test_thread test_threadedtempfile test_tokenize test_winreg test_xreadline No idea why. Offhand, from the symptoms it looks like a change may be sending stdout into a black hole. Constructs like sys.stdout = StringIO() ! self.assertRaises(self.parser.parse_args, (cmdline_args,), None, ! SystemExit, expected_output, ! self.redirected_stdout) sys.stdout = sys.__stdout__ in the patch certainly intensify that suspicion <wink>.

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test_sort.py failure
by Guido van Rossum 31 Jul '04

31 Jul '04

I had test_sort.py fail once on line 143 (in test_bug453523). Later it wouldn't fail. The code in question uses a random generator. Could I have been unlucky enough that the particular random sequence it used this time didn't create the intended failure condition? --Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/)

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RE: [Python-Dev] MSI Documentation
by Moore, Paul 31 Jul '04

31 Jul '04

From: "Martin v. Löwis" > As for more documentation on the mechanisms of msi.py itself: I have > asked a colleague to go through the file and comment on parts of Python > code that might be unclear. However, I have the concern that all his > questions are likely answered in MSDN - so I'd be really curious what > documentation is lacking that is *not* part of MSDN. I wouldn't worry too much about that. I've never found it easy to follow the documentation on building MSIs (it is a *long* time since I tried, maybe things have improved). A bit of duplication wouldn't harm here. Paul. __________________________________________________________________________ This e-mail and the documents attached are confidential and intended solely for the addressee; it may also be privileged. If you receive this e-mail in error, please notify the sender immediately and destroy it. As its integrity cannot be secured on the Internet, the Atos Origin group liability cannot be triggered for the message content. Although the sender endeavours to maintain a computer virus-free network, the sender does not warrant that this transmission is virus-free and will not be liable for any damages resulting from any virus transmitted. __________________________________________________________________________

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Pie thrown
by Guido van Rossum 30 Jul '04

30 Jul '04

The pie has been thrown. As was known ahead of time, the Parrot team conceded the contest: http://www.mail-archive.com/perl6-all@perl.org/msg40418.html (and followup). At the start of OSCON's final keynote, in front of (2000?) attendees, I received $10 and a 12-pack of beer, and Dan received a cream pie in the face. I believe the event was captured on video. Thanks to Dan for being a good sport! We'll be consuming the beer at the Vancouver Python workshop. --Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/)

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PEP 262 - active?
by Heiko Wundram 30 Jul '04

30 Jul '04

Hey all! Is anybody actively working on PEP 262? I'm currently in the process of implementing something like it for a package I'm writing, and I'd be glad to sponsor the code once it's complete. I've tried to check out what's in the Python CVS sandbox, but can't get it at the moment because of network connectivity issues, and the tracker entries on the bugtracker aren't very helpful either (besides stating that the PEP was abandoned, and later reopened). If there's interest, I'll write up a short text describing what my package can do in addition to what PEP 262 describes, and how it's integrated with distutils. Heiko.

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Static builds on Windows
by Thomas Heller 29 Jul '04

29 Jul '04

I'm trying to build a static Python library on Windows. Obviously this can be done by compiling the sources defining the Py_NO_ENABLE_SHARED preprocessor symbol. The resulting executable crashes when trying to load external extension modules, because it tries to load another Python instance (from python23.dll). Much better, of course, would be if the executable wouild refuse to load extension modules, which can be forced by commenting out the definition of HAVE_DYNAMIC_LOADING in PC/pyconfig.h. Now, shouldn't the definition of this symbol be protected by #ifndef Py_NO_ENABLE_SHARED, or is there already a different mechanism (without the need to change the source files)? Thomas Index: pyconfig.h =================================================================== RCS file: /cvsroot/python/python/dist/src/PC/pyconfig.h,v retrieving revision 1.26 diff -c -r1.26 pyconfig.h *** pyconfig.h 10 Feb 2004 16:50:19 -0000 1.26 --- pyconfig.h 28 Jul 2004 17:31:20 -0000 *************** *** 399,406 **** --- 399,408 ---- /* Define if you have clock. */ /* #define HAVE_CLOCK */ + #ifndef Py_NO_ENABLE_SHARED /* Define when any dynamic module loading is enabled */ #define HAVE_DYNAMIC_LOADING + #endif /* Define if you have ftime. */ #define HAVE_FTIME

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MSI Documentation
by "Martin v. Löwis" 29 Jul '04

29 Jul '04

I've added a bit of documentation on using the 2.4 MSI package, at http://www.python.org/2.4/msi.html If you think something is incorrect, or should be added, please let me know (or change it yourself if you can). Regards, Martin

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unnamed defs
by marcus 29 Jul '04

29 Jul '04

Being unsatisfied with the way lambda works, i wondered what would the python guys think of this: class X: ____my_static_method = staticmethod(def (x, y): { ________some statements ____}) I hope decorators will be better for this case, but it's only an example. The word 'lambda' could be used instead of 'def', i don't know what would be better. The motivation of this suggestion is to improve consistency of the language and correcting the one-expression-lambda we currently have. Look how consistent Lua is in this regard. Passing functions to functions is considered useful by many people (essential, sometimes), but 'lambda' cannot be used even when all we need is a function that has an 'if' or an assignment, for example. 'lambda' seems to be a hack. Since unnamed functions can to be used anywhere, i chose braces as delimiters, but indentation would work normally inside them. Also, the syntax is easy to recognize and is not ambiguous. If Python (3.0? 2.5?) had this feature, i would be very happy! I suspect that this subject has already been discussed, but it's easier to find lambda tricks than a good rationale of its limitations.

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Rationale behind removing kwdict from keyword.py?
by Fernando Perez 29 Jul '04

29 Jul '04

Hi all, I recently got a report from a user of a project of mine breaking under 2.4a1. The reason is that keyword stopped having a kwdict variable in it. Is there any rationale behind this change? I know I can always work around it, but this honestly feels, to me, like gratuitous breakage. It would be nice if things like public members (it wasn't called _kwdict, so I had no reason to assume it was off-limits) of modules in the standard library were kept stably across releases unless there is a good reason to break compatibility. While the html docs for keyword don't mention kwdict, I often simply use help(module) to look for what I need, and I saw kwdict happily listed there, without any leading _ to indicate any sense of it being private. The changes were made, according to viewCVS, in revision 1.13. I know I can use iskeyword() for my purposes, and patch accordingly. But I'd like to remind the core developers that when things go into the stdlib, people start using them. Removing stuff will _always_ break code. I'll gladly file a SF bug report against this, but I'd like not to waste anyone's time if it won't be considered. Thanks to all. Best, Fernando Perez.

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RE: [Python-Dev] RE: test_sort.py failure
by Delaney, Timothy C (Timothy) 29 Jul '04

29 Jul '04

Tim Peters wrote: > I think I have a fix for this, and will check it in when the tests > finish. > > However, it doesn't fail on my box -- MS is *always* moving the memory > around. So I hope that, before someone rebuilds with the checkin, > they temporarily fiddle the test on their box so it fails more often. > I expect that setting the list size to 3 instead of 50 will do that. > If you set it to 1, the test will never fail. Might it be worthwhile trying to capture *one* starting point that provokes this behaviour consistently on some machines and include that as an additional specific test case? I guess it would depend on how consistently it could be provoked. Tim Delaney

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