On Thu, Aug 11, 2011 at 6:05 PM, Terry Reedy <tjreedy@udel.edu> wrote:
There was no comparable transition. Python 2.0 was basically 1.6 renamed for a different distributor.
No that's not true. If you compare the "what's new" sections there is quite a large difference between 1.6 and 2.0, despite being released simultaneously.
I regard Python 2.2, which introduced new-style, as the beginning of Python 2 as something significantly different from Python 1.
Just compare: http://www.python.org/download/releases/2.0/ http://www.python.org/download/releases/1.6/ No argument that 2.2 was a big jump for the type system -- but not for Unicode.
I suppose one could also point to the earlier intro of unicode.
In 1.6. (But internally we called it the "contractual obligation release", a Monty Python reference.)
The new iterator protocol was also a major change. In any case, back compatibility was kept in all three respects (and others) until Python 3.
(I gotta go, but I don't think it was such a big deal -- it was very carefully made backwards compatible.) -- --Guido van Rossum (python.org/~guido)