[Python-checkins] r46520 - in python/trunk: Doc/Makefile.deps Doc/lib/lib.tex Doc/lib/libfunctional.tex Doc/lib/libfunctools.tex Lib/test/test_functional.py Lib/test/test_functools.py Misc/NEWS Modules/_functoolsmodule.c Modules/functionalmodule.

[Tim Peters]

[Brett Cannon]
> Where would this list be stored?  If the import fails the module is not
> imported, so how do you get access to the list?

Oh, details ;-)

> It could be some function that *must* be called before any imports
> that registers with test.test_support what modules it can not be
> able to import and then check that way.

That would work.  Or the list could be stored in a stylized comment,
which regrtest.py sucks up via searching the source when it catches an
import error.

> Otherwise the list would just have to be external to all tests (which
> might not be so bad to have a master list of modules we think can
> be skipped on various platforms and then what modules can fail on
> import for what tests).

That can work too.  The only thing that can't work is the current scheme.

A hole is that whether an import failure should mean "test skipped"
also depends on the platform, like that test_startfile should suffer
an import failure unless you're on Windows (in which case it should
not).  It can also depend on how the platform is configured (e.g.,
test_bsddb3 or test_zipimport depend on whether you've installed
external libraries).  But I'm happy to take improvement over
perfection.