[Python-Dev] distutils and bdist_wininst confusion: clarification

[Thomas Heller]

> Thomas, thanks for the explanation.  I agree that you can check in the
> changes yourself as you proposed.
> 
> There's one issue I still don't understand (not having the time to
> read the full distutils docs): how does a typical Windows developer
> decide whether to use an external zip utility or the zipfile module?
I'm afraid it is not documented.

Distutils first tries to spawn an external zip program,
then tries the zipfile module, if nothing is found,
a warning is issued.

So, the windows developer currently _must_ install zip.exe
somewhere in the path. (As often, the default is wrong,
because a zip utility is not included in windows).

Thomas