On Thu, 7 Oct 2004 19:55:03 -0400, Raymond Hettinger wrote:

Where there are multiple, competing third party solutions, Guido has historically resisted ending exploration by locking in a single solution. Instead, he said he prefers "category killers" such as the unittest and logging modules. Martin has also been clear that community acceptance and a commitment to on-going maintenance are also important considerations.

I see the reasoning behind this position. But I fear it can lead to lack of standardization in some areas. There is at least one area where a firm position would greatly clarify things: standard interfaces for modules where multiple providers are always the norm, such as the DB API and WSGI. WSGI is working is way out, but it's still too early to tell if they will be successful. But the DB API could really take advantage of a BDFL-style intervention to settle things. (it does not *need* to be Guido, but it has to be someone with power enough to take a firm stand and enforce it; but I don't know anyone who could assume this role as the undisputed leader of the DB-API effort).

For the core, python-dev discussions indicate that several things are still in the works and will probably happen depending on who has the time, interest, and ability:

* Someday, decimal may become a built-in type. * The AST version of the compiler may get finished. * A mutable bytes type may emerge on the road to all strings being Unicode. * Someday, C99 may rule the roost and cmath will be updated. * One of three proposals may be accepted for optimized attribute lookup. * A bytecode verifier seems to have a chance. * reST support may be added when it becomes mature enough. * The project to transition to unittests and increase coverage is continuing. * If the class/instance semantics get worked out, exceptions may become new style classes along the road to Py3.0.

Nice summary.

FWIW, there is a trend toward providing pure python equivalents to CPython implementations (such as that for compiler, sets, bisect, heapq, deques, itertools, decimal, etc). The thought is that these may outlive their C counterparts.

That's great -- I mean, taken to its maximum expression, Python would be able to bootstrap itself this way (a Python VM written in Python?). It's a sign of maturity, don't you think?

...

i am personaly very interested in improving the stdlib which is very messy in my opinion right now.

It's not clear whether you're volunteering or just making a vague blanket request/criticism. If it is the former, then the backlog of bug reports and patch reviews is a good place to start.

I still need to find my way there (docs/sourceforge stuff). Depending on the way my current projects go, I may still be able to dedicate some time to it. I'm really looking forward to it... -- Carlos Ribeiro Consultoria em Projetos blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com mail: carribeiro@gmail.com mail: carribeiro@yahoo.com

Hello all, There must be something about the way I write my comments that may be making them sound worst than I want. I have _no_ intention to start a flame war... and I really would like to make it sound constructive. I apologize if it sounded otherwise. (I have a few comments that still belong here, if only to clarify things) On Fri, 08 Oct 2004 10:54:34 +0200, M.-A. Lemburg wrote:

Note that there is no need to "settle things": the DB-API spec has been around for many years, is very stable, widely used and still flexible enough to meet requirements of various different database backends.

There are several packages around that don't implement the DB API correctly, or implement a completely different API. This is clearly not a fault of the DB API itself, or of its developers, but it's an issue for its users. It's a difficult situation, because nobody is really in a position to enforce compliance. In this sense, bringing the issue to the standard library _could_ be helpful. One suggestion is to have a reference implementation -- for example, a simple DB API module, or a library that makes use of DB-API compliant modules. Of course, it's open to discussion whether this is feasible or not; for now it's only a personal opinion.

If you feel that a certain feature is missing, I'd suggest you direct your constructive criticism to the db-sig@python.org.

I think the DB API itself is fine. What is lacking is some way to make sure that everyone _comply_ to it. If that's can be done within the DB-SIG group alone, fine. -- Carlos Ribeiro Consultoria em Projetos blog: http://rascunhosrotos.blogspot.com blog: http://pythonnotes.blogspot.com mail: carribeiro@gmail.com mail: carribeiro@yahoo.com