[Distutils] Deployment with setuptools: a basket-of-eggs approach

[Iwan Vosloo]

Hi Maris,

I'm not suggesting using apt - just thinking about the difference in
models.  I suppose the pure python equivalent of apt and its
repositories would be to have your own private PyPi (the respository),
and using easy_install to install things from there onto individual
machines.  This does not necessitate more work: installing and
updating packages on individual machines _from_ this central
repository can also be automated.  For example by running a script in
cron every night or so.

This gives you a set of _released_ packages (those in the repository),
and different machines where instances of packages are _installed_.

I suppose there is a correlation between what Philip calls an
environment in this sense, and a machine in the debian/apt world.  An
environment is just a more abstract way of looking at it allowing more
flexibility.

Also, I tend to package everything as an egg - applications also.
Eggs are just a way to package software to me, not libraries?

-i