[Distutils] [Python-Dev] PEP 365 (Adding the pkg_resources module)

[Guido van Rossum]

I was using the human interface at python.org/pypi. There are two
prominent links at the top of the page: "Browse the tree of packages"
and "Submit package information" followed by the 30 most recently
changed packages. What I was looking for was the page for a specific
package. The "Browse the tree of packages" link was no help. Finally I
realized that in the side bar, in a small unobtrusive font, is a link
to "List packages" which links to a list of *all* packages, in
alphabetical order. I found my package there. I think repeating that
link right below "browse the tree" would have been sufficient. But it
would have been cool if there had been a search box (also in the start
page) where I could type (part of) the name of the package and it
would have given me the nearest matches.

On Wed, Mar 19, 2008 at 6:05 PM, "Martin v. Löwis" <martin at v.loewis.de> wrote:
> > I don't understand PyPI all that well; it seems poor design that the
>  > browsing via keywords is emphasized but there is no easy way to
>  > *search* for a keyword (the list of all packages is not emphasized
>  > enough on the main page -- it occurs in the side bar but not in the
>  > main text).
>
>  I don't understand. What is "browsing via keywords" and how is that
>  emphasized? (one I know that, I can look into ways for searching
>  for keywords)
>
>
>  > I assume there's a programmatic API (XML-RPC?) but I
>  > haven't found it yet.
>
>  The recommended "programmatic" API is
>
>
>  http://pypi.python.org/simple/
>
>  Not sure what you were trying to achieve programmatically;
>  "typically" people know what they want to install (e.g.
>  "threadedcomments"), and then the tool goes directly to
>
>  http://pypi.python.org/simple/threadedcomments/
>
>  Regards,
>  Martin
>
>



-- 
--Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/)