[Distutils] Distutils and Distribute roadmap (and some words on Virtualenv, Pip)

[Paul Moore]

2009/10/28 Chris Withers <chris at simplistix.co.uk>:
> Paul Moore wrote:
>>
>> Maybe someone has confused me. I understood that easy_install can
>> consume bdist_wininst format .exe files just as easily as .egg format,
>> and easy_install will do your dependency management for you.
>>
>> So, if you provide a bdist_wininst .exe format file:
>>
>> 1. People who want integration with add/remove just run the .exe and are
>> happy.
>
> But will people not be surprised that none of the dependencies are installed
> if they do this?

No. That's the nature of Windows installers. I accept that your view
is that automatic installation of dependencies is a key feature -
please accept in turn that I prefer to manage dependencies manually.

>> If you provide egg format files, only group (2) are satisfied. And if
>> you provide both, you just make extra work for yourself.
>
> It generally equates to typing a whole extra len('bdist_wininst') characters
> ;-)

Hmm, OK, fair point :-) It's a pity more people don't just do it then...

>> suspect, based on my own behaviour, that there's a proportion of
>> people who won't ask for a bdist_wininst, but will just not bother
>> with your package (depending on lots of other things, not least of
>> which is the level of competition).
>
> They're welcome to go elsewhere if they can't be bothered to use what's
> available or ask for what they think they need.

True. Certainly in the case of "ask for what they think they need".
I'm less convinced that "use what's available" is always appropriate
(see below).

>> wxPython, PyQT, PyGame, cx_Oracle, pywin32, PIL, lxml, numpy, pyCrypto
>>
>> I can't build these myself, and if the projects only provide eggs, I
>> can't use them (unless I use easy_install or something similar, and
>> accept the implications of that).
>
> ..or you just place the egg on your python path...

My personal issue with this is that I lose the one listing of what I
have installed from add/remove programs, and I lose the one-click
uninstall of add/remove. This adds to my management overhead for my
Python installation.

Lots of this is personal preference. No argument there.

Paul.