[Distutils] Finishing PEP 345

"Martin v. Löwis" martin at v.loewis.de
Thu Dec 24 11:44:54 CET 2009


>>> And I will not care much about the micro version in that case, since
>>> Python will not change its syntax/API in a micro release.
>> I think that's a mistake. Specifying "2.6" is equivalent to specifying
>> "==2.6". With your proposed meaning of "==", either == is not
>> transitive, or all versions compare equal. As 2.6==2.6.1 and 2.6==2.6.2,
>> we get (with transitive ==), 2.6.1==2.6.2.
>>
>> Furthermore, if the same wildcarding applies to major versions as well,
>> i.e.
>>
>> Requires-Python: 3
>>
>> means any 3.x, then we have 3==3.1, 3==3.2, 3.1==3.1.3, 3.2==3.2.4,
>> and, transitively, 3.1.3==3.2.4. This is undesirable.
> 
> Why this is undesirable ?

I find it undesirable if 3.1.3==3.2.4. Then, if I specify

Requires-Python: 3.1.3

and I have 3.2.4 installed, it would accept that (because the
version numbers are "equal", i.e. "==").

> I find it highly desirable for developers that don't want to
> bother with Python version details, while it will let other developers
> give precise versions if they need.

That is desirable, indeed. However, it is also possible without
== performing some wildcard matching:

Requires-Python: >=2.5,<2.6

will also specify that 2.5.x is required.

> You'll have to convince me otherwise by explaining why it's a mistake
> to apply wildcarding when the full version is not provided.

See above: is == transitive or not?

I think it is counter-intuitive if the == operator on versions does
anything else than comparing version strings for string equality.
If you think that a range matching operator is needed, perhaps
a different symbol could be used (such as ~=)?

>>> 3.6 would include all 3.6.x releases as well. So 3.6b4 is excluded
>>> since it does not belong to the 3.6 series, but 3.6.1b4 is included.
>> Please define "belongs to the 3.6 series". In PEP 386 terminology,
>> I would expect that this means "the 'version' part is 3.6", so
>> 3.6b4 *does* belong to the 3.6 series.
> 
> Sorry, here's the definition I've put behind the word belong:
> 
> A version belongs to the 3.6 series if : 3.6 <= VERSION < 3.7
> 
> 3.6b4 is the fourth beta release, so :
> 
> 3.6b4 < 3.6 <= VERSION < 3.7
> 
> So obviously, if the developer ask for 3.6, he doesn't want a preview of that
> version, he wants that version

Where is that specified? I can't find it in the PEP.

If you really want this == operator, please add a Discussion section to
the PEP discussing that there was objection to this operator, proposing
that it should do string== instead, and that this specific semantics was
chosen because <insert reason>.

Regards,
Martin

P.S. I notice that your == definition and my explicit rewrite of it have
the same flaw: in your example, "3.7b1" would also match a version
specification of "3.6". I.e. prereleases of the next releases still fall
into the previous range.


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