[New-bugs-announce] [issue46381] Improve documentation of CFLAGS_NODIST, LDFLAGS_NODIST

[Matthias Köppe]

New submission from Matthias Köppe <matthiaskoeppe at gmail.com>:

The documentation of
- https://docs.python.org/3.11/using/configure.html#envvar-CFLAGS
- https://docs.python.org/3.11/using/configure.html#envvar-CFLAGS_NODIST
- https://docs.python.org/3.11/using/configure.html#envvar-LDFLAGS
- https://docs.python.org/3.11/using/configure.html#envvar-LDFLAGS_NODIST
should explain more clearly that flags such as `-I`, `-L`, etc. and strict compiler flags such as `-Werror...` should not be put into `CFLAGS`, `LDFLAGS`, or it will make the resulting Python unusable for compiling user packages with extension modules via `distutils` and `setuptools`.

Various downstream packagers have provided misconfigured Pythons:
- Homebrew (https://trac.sagemath.org/ticket/31132, https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew-core/pull/68528, resolved)
- Cygwin (https://trac.sagemath.org/ticket/33078, https://cygwin.com/pipermail/cygwin/2021-December/250302.html, resolved in a proposed package update)
- pyenv (https://trac.sagemath.org/ticket/32531, https://github.com/pyenv/pyenv/issues/2204, open)

So this appears to be a documentation / user education issue in CPython.

----------
assignee: docs at python
components: Documentation
messages: 410586
nosy: docs at python, matthiaskoeppe
priority: normal
severity: normal
status: open
title: Improve documentation of CFLAGS_NODIST, LDFLAGS_NODIST
type: enhancement
versions: Python 3.10, Python 3.11, Python 3.7, Python 3.8, Python 3.9

_______________________________________
Python tracker <report at bugs.python.org>
<https://bugs.python.org/issue46381>
_______________________________________