[Ironpython-users] IronPython foundations work

[Jeff Hardy]

IronPython's foundations have been a minor issue since it was split
off from MS, and I never really found the time to address them. I've
made some progress, and these improvements should make the project
better in the long run.

I've mainly been working on an improved build system for IronPython
and it's finally ready. I have a pull request up at
https://github.com/IronLanguages/main/pull/48 because I'd like to get
a few more eyes on it to make sure I didn't miss anything obvious. The
big advantage is that release packages are much easier to build and
version numbers are stored in one place, so I can spin up packages
much quicker than before. It will also allow for nightly builds on
teamcity.codebetter.com. Building is now as easy as going into the
root and typing 'msbuild' or 'make'.

Automated tests work much better - the TestRunner had a tendency to
deadlock on a handful of tests, but those should be gone. I still need
to add a Test target to the build system to make it easier to use,
though.

Lots of tests are still failing; see
http://teamcity.codebetter.com/viewLog.html?buildId=35599 (click
"Login as Guest" if you don't have an account). Most of them are
Python standard library tests; some help working on making those
green would be very much appreciated.

2.7.2 is currently targeted for late February; the first alpha release
will probably be early January, but there's lots of time after that to
get changes in. If not, 2.7.3 will be released in June.

I think 2.7.2 is going to be a good release. Alex almost has zipimport
working, which means that setuptools/distribute will be much easier to
support. Getting virtualenv and pip to work as well would complete
that set of important Python tools. I have some surprises that I'm
working on as well that will greatly interest some people.

There's still lots of issues to go through for 2.7.2, though:
http://bit.ly/ipy-272-issues. Any help there would be much
appreciated; if you need any help getting started making changes to
IronPython, don't hesitate to ask. If you don't know where to start, a
missing module (pyexpat, bz2, etc.) is a good place to start because
there's lots of examples to draw from.

IronPython's first year was good. There's some momentum to the project
now, and I'd like to see that continue into 2012. Getting more people
involved as developers is key, so if there's anything I can do to help
with that, let me know.

All the best to you and yours,
Jeff

P.S. If you haven't taken the IronPython 2011 survey yet, please do!
It only takes a few minutes. http://bit.ly/ipy-2011-survey. Thanks!