[IronPython] importing os module

[Brian Lloyd]

> Others know more than I do, but writing a CPython module in C 
> interacts very significantly with mechanisms that are 
> internal to the Python interpreter, and needs to be involved 
> with the reference-counting mechanism that's the basis of 
> CPython's garbage collector (when IronPython uses the .Net 
> collector and doesn't use reference counting).  Also, a 
> CPython C-coded module manipulates data structures that 
> actually ARE the internal data structures of the interpreter. 
>  The IronPython interpreter shares none of those structures.

Right - the fact that CPython encourages/forces you to work with 
structs, pointers, etc. directly is the real problem. If there 
were a truly 'abstract' interface for C extensions it would be 
much easier to contemplate a CLR (or other VM) abstraction layer. 

I bet the PyPy folks wish that were true as well ;)


Brian Lloyd        brian at zope.com
V.P. Engineering   540.361.1716              
Zope Corporation   http://www.zope.com