[Distutils] pywin32 on wheels [was: Beyond wheels 1.0: helping downstream, FHS and more]

[Paul Moore]

On 16 April 2015 at 11:11, Tim Golden <mail at timgolden.me.uk> wrote:
> Really, pywin32 is several things: a set of libraries (win32api,
> win32file, etc.); some system-level support for various things (COM
> registration, Service support etc.); and a development/editing
> environment (pythonwin).

That sounds about right.

> I see this ending up as (respectively): as venv-friendly wheel; a py -m
> script of the kind Paul suggests; and an installable app with the usual
> start menu icons etc.

Again, yes, that seems reasonable. Personally, for the uses I see of
pywin32, it would make sense to split it into a number of separate
wheels (win32api, win32file, ...) to reduce the dependency footprint
for projects that only use one or two functions out of the whole
thing, but honestly ctypes is probably still a better approach for
that scenario, so the benefit of such a split is likely minimal.

> In my copious spare time I'll at least try to visit the pywin32 codebase
> to see how viable all this is. Feel free to challenge my thoughts on the
> matter.

I think you're going in the right direction. The hardest parts are
likely to be where the Windows architecture interferes (COM
registration and services).

Paul.