[Distutils] zc.buildout: download utility vs. local resources

[Thomas Lotze]

Thomas Lotze wrote:

> I'd like to make the decision about using a private or shared copy more
> explicit and foreseeable. The obvious way to do this is adding another
> keyword parameter to the download call that expresses whether hard-linking
> should be attempted. I'm however not at all clear on what would be a
> sensible default value:
> 
> Using a shared copy may not be desirable if client code is going to modify
> the file after downloading, so attempting to create hard links by default
> is the more dangerous behaviour. Always copying, on the other hand, means
> that when using a cache (or "downloading" a file-system resource) every
> download creates multiple copies of potentially large files in the file
> system, which is unnecessary in what I think is the majority of cases.

Since nobody seems to have a strong opinion on the matter, I'm going to go
ahead and use a default value that means creating copies. This feels like
the cleaner solution as it creates no surprises and puts optimisation at
the user's descretion.

-- 
Thomas