[Distutils] draft PEP: manylinux2

[Thomas Kluyver]

On Mon, Feb 5, 2018, at 2:38 PM, Ivan Pozdeev via Distutils-SIG wrote:
> The point is, a year has negative informativity in this case.
> 
> The very reasoning "compatible with most distributions released since 
> year <X>" is flawed 'cuz it's vague and nonintuitive. Which is "most" 
> distributions? Which part of the year X? Does that mean <distribution X 
> version Y> is included or not? How do I even know all that without 
> checking the spec? (Normally, a year in an entity's name means that 
> entity's release year.) That, provided I even remember the relevant 
> years -- since compatibility is governed by other things, I have 
> absolutely no reason to.
> 
> A year would thus add confusion and/or encourage people to use that 
> "easy way out" reasoning and not actually check what they're signing up 
> for -- with the ensuing landmines to step on.


People are going to take the easy way out anyway. I've made manylinux1 wheels, and I've never gone through and checked what distributions they are meant to be compatible with - I just assume that it will probably be most ones that I care about.

I think the key question is how informative the year is. If there's a 80%+ chance that a distribution released in 2011 or 2012 supports manylinux2010, then I think it's helpful to make the year more obvious, even if there are a few counterexamples.