[Distutils] SETUPTOOLS - Loading Eggs which do not have an egg_info

[Phillip J. Eby]

At 08:24 PM 12/8/2006 +0200, Ilias Lazaridis wrote:
>Retrieving a few values directly from the setup.py (instead from an
>egg-info) would be fast and without any dependency.

In order to invoke run_setup to get the data, you must import, *at absolute 
minimum*:

distutils
distutils.cmd
distutils.core
distutils.dist
distutils.util
distutils.errors
distutils.command
distutils.command.install
distutils.command.sdist
distutils.command.install_lib
setuptools
setuptools.dist
setuptools.depends
setuptools.extension
setuptools.command
setuptools.command.install
setuptools.command.sdist
setuptools.command.install_lib
Pyrex.Distutils.build_ext (if it's installed)

And I didn't even go through all of these modules to see what *they* 
import.  It also ignores any customization features usage.

And you want to do all this, to avoid writing cache files?


> > If a project uses custom egg-info or other setuptools extensions, you must
> > import those as well.  All of this, to avoid writing some data to disk 
> that
> > could then be read simply and directly without involving any of those 
> other
> > imports!  The redundancy you're complaining about is a major 
> enhancement to
> > startup performance.
>
>eggs can cover 'light' needs and 'heavy' needs.
>
>Possibly for the 'heavy' needs its an enhancement.
>
>But for the 'light' needs, the overall overhead is (from my point of
>view) inacceptable.

That's because you're not paying attention to anyone's needs but your 
own.  The use cases you consider "heavy" may be considered "light" by other 
people.  Anything that one person does not happen to need, they will 
consider "heavy".  Someone who doesn't use entry points, for example, will 
consider *your* use of them to be "heavy", even as you consider their other 
egg_info uses to be "heavy" instead of "light", as they consider those uses 
to be.

Thus, your view of the situation is extremely self-centered, especially 
since you've received plenty of help in how to minimize the overhead -- it 
requires you to run a single command before checkin or source distribution, 
and *only* in the case where you have changed your version number or entry 
points.  If that's too much work for you, then this is indeed the wrong 
toolset for you.  You should instead spend large amounts of time developing 
and testing your own system, so that you can save that handful of 
keystrokes needed to type "setup.py egg_info" every once in a while.  Good 
luck to you on that.  :)


> > As I've said, an ability to auto-generate egg_info if a setup.py is newer
> > than the corresponding PKG-INFO might be a useful feature.  However, 
> trying
> > to do without generating it at all, simply isn't going to happen.
>
>I understand.
>
>Thus the only way to avoid "egg-info" is to avoid setuptools.

Correct.  Your choices are as follows:

1. get used to typing "setup.py egg_info" when you change your project's 
version number or entry points
2. write a script or alias to do it for you whenever you check your code in, or
3. reinvent the wheel so you can save a minute or two doing one of the above.

If you choose #3, I sure hope it is because you're doing this for a hobby 
or personal project, because if you aren't, then you are defrauding your 
employer or client by diverting their funds for your personal enjoyment at 
wheel reinventing, while providing them with no additional benefits.