[Distutils] Extending distutils with 3rd party build commands?

[Bob Ippolito]

On Oct 22, 2004, at 17:18, Fred L. Drake, Jr. wrote:

> One thing that no one has mentioned in this thread is the 
> "command-packages"
> support I added to distutils for Python 2.4.  I think this supports 
> Bob's use
> case well.
>
> What's needed is to install a Python package containing the new 
> commands
> somewhere on the search path (preferably in .../site-packages).  Then 
> edit
> the Python installations distutils config file (bet you didn't know 
> about
> that!) to include
>
>     [global]
>     command-packages=my.pkg
>
> The new commands will be available for all setup.py scripts.
>
> This is a documented feature; you can read more about it at
>
>     http://www.python.org/dev/doc/devel/dist/node29.html

That does indeed support this use case.. I may have to move things 
around in the package a bit to support it, but it may just work.

Now what about the "Python installations distutils config file"?  
Where's that located?  I don't see it referenced in the documentation.. 
  Can that file be placed somewhere on site-packages like sitecustomize 
(good), or does it require editing a root-owned vendor file (bad)?

-bob