[Numpy-discussion] f2py - a recap

[Fernando Perez]

Hi all,

I'm just reposting here to see if anyone with a stake in f2py has an
opinion/advice on the points below.  F2py feels very much in
autopilot/drifting into the icebergs mode right now.  Is that correct
assessment?

If there's any guidance on where to go, I can at least file tickets on
these points, but I don't want to create unnecessary tickets on trac
if others feel the current  situation is satisfactory and it's just me
who is confused.

Cheers,

f

On Fri, Jul 18, 2008 at 9:00 PM, Fernando Perez <fperez.net at gmail.com> wrote:
> Howdy,
>
> today's exercise with f2py left some lessons learned, mostly thanks to
> Robert's excellent help, for which I'm grateful.
>
> I'd like to recap here what we have, mostly to decide what changes (if
> any) should go into numpy to make the experience less "interesting"
> for future users:
>
> - Remove the f2py_options flag from
> numpy.distutils.extension.Extension? If so, do options like
> '--debug_capi' get correctly passed via setup.cfg?
>
> This flag is potentially very confusing, because only *some* f2py
> options get actually set this way, while others need to be set in
> calls to config_fc.
>
> - How to properly set the compiler options in a setup.py file? Robert
> suggested the setup.cfg file, but this doesn't get picked up unless
> config_fc is explicitly called by the user:
>
> ./setup.py config_fc  etc...
>
> This is perhaps a distutils problem,  but I don't know if we can
> solve it more cleanly.  It seems to me that it should be possible to
> provide a setup.py file that can be used simply as
>
> ./setup.py install
>
> (with the necessary setup.cfg  file sitting next to it). I'm thinking
> here of what we need to do when  showing how 'easy' these tools are
> for scientists migrating from matlab, for example.  Obscure, special
> purpose incantations tend to tarnish our message of ease :)
>
> - Should the 'instead' word  be removed from the f2py docs regarding
> the use of .pyf sources?  It appears to be a mistake, which threw at
> least me for a loop for a while.
>
> - Why does f2py in the source tree have *both* a doc/ and a docs/
> directory?  It's really confusing to see this.
>
> f2py happens to be a very important tool, not just because scipy
> couldn't build without it, but also to position python as a credible
> integration language for scientific work.  So I hope we can make using
> it as easy and robust as is technically feasible.
>
> Cheers,
>
> f
>