[Distutils] distlib and wheel metadata

[Paul Moore]

On 23 February 2017 at 08:18, Nick Coghlan <ncoghlan at gmail.com> wrote:
> I'm not a huge fan of having simple boolean toggles in metadata definitions
> (hence the more elaborate idea of two different kinds of dependency
> declaration), but this may be a case where that's a good way to go, since it
> would mean that services and tools that care can check it (with a
> recommendation in the spec saying that public index servers SHOULD check
> it), while those that don't care would continue to have a single unified set
> of dependency declarations to work with.

While boolean metadata may not be ideal in the general case, I think
it makes sense here. If you want to make it more acceptable, maybe
make it Package-Type, with values "application" or "library".

On a related but tangential point, can I make a plea for using simpler
language when documenting this (and even when discussing it)? The term
"pre-integrated application" means very little to me in any practical
sense beyond "application", and it brings a whole load of negative
connotations - I deal with Java build processes on occasion, and the
whole terminology there ("artifacts", "deployment units", ...) makes
for a pretty hostile experience for the newcomer. I'd like to avoid
Python packaging going down that route - even if the cost is a little
vagueness in terms.

Paul