[Distutils] Sooner or later, we're going to have to be more formal about how we name packages.

[holger krekel]

On Sun, Jun 02, 2013 at 09:32 +1000, Nick Coghlan wrote:
> I'm with Jason in the "maybe eventually, but not right now" camp.
> 
> Namespace collisions are indeed a possibility and a potential concern, both
> in the distribution namespace and the top level import namespace.

Indeed, in this thread, i assumed we were only talking about
distribution/pypi namespacing.  Somewhat proper import namespacing is only
available with very recent python versions which still have a long way
to become mainstream.

> The fact there is no 1to1 mapping between distribution names and the import
> namespace means that informal conflict avoidance is already possible -
> prepending "<qualifier>-" to the desired package name makes it possible to
> publish it alongside another distribution using the same name without
> having to change the top level import location. If the distributed packages
> use explicit relative imports appropriately, an integrator may even be able
> to use them side by side by dropping them into higher level namespace
> packages.
> 
> Java's "use the domain name" approach simply outsources the conflict
> resolution to a third party, by *requiring* that publishers acquire a
> domain name prior to publication. I prefer our model of initially
> *assuming* a lack of conflict to lower barriers to publication.
> 
> I do think we need to better handle cases where the assumption breaks down,
> but we shouldn't forget namespacing is already possible.

If pypi has no idea about namespaces (like i considered them in my other post)
then using namespaces do not really provide much.  Someone can still come along
and publish within that pseudo-namespace.  I would think the goal of 
pypi-namespaces would be to give a group control over anything that's
released using it, allowing to communicate install-users certain guarantees.

However, before further discussion i think there first needs to be more
reasoning and stating of practical problems with the current
anyone-can-register-anything-that's-not-taken model.

best,
holger

> Cheers,
> Nick.

> _______________________________________________
> Distutils-SIG maillist  -  Distutils-SIG at python.org
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/distutils-sig