[Distutils] distribute_setup.use_setuptools: what if I want to keep the existing old setuptools?

[Sridhar Ratnakumar]

Tarek,

For some background on this, see http://bitbucket.org/srid/modern-package-template/issue/9/distribute_setup-should-not-be-used#comment-139503

The intent behind calling distribute_setup.use_setuptools (and ez_setup.use_setuptools) is that if the user does not have setuptools installed,  running "python setup.py install" will automatically install it for him. 

But if the user already has setuptools, running distribute_setup.use_setuptools upgrades that installation to Distribute. This goes against the original intention, correct?

Is it reasonable to provide an option to `use_setuptools` that would decide if Distribute must replace the existing setuptools or not?

-srid



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