[Python-Dev] Should Python compile as C++?

[Gerhard Häring]

I'm currently doing a native mingw32 port of Python, and I've hit the
ugly "initializer is not a constant" problem mentioned in the FAQ. Hmm,
looks like I have three options:

1 Fix the Python sources in the Object/ directory and initalize the
  structs in a seperate init_objects function
2 compile Python with a C++ compiler
3 fix the mingw32 compiler

When trying option 2, I recognized that a lot of Python's source is not
valid ANSI C++. There are even variable names like "class" and "new".
There are of course less obvious issues when trying to make the source
compile as C++, in particular a lot more casts are needed. If it's just
that Python is supposed to compile as C++ but it hasn't been tested for
a while, I could do the necessary fixes and submit a patch. But if
that's a new idea, I don't know if fixing it now makes sense.

Because I plan to submit the required changes as a patch when the port
is ready, I'd like to know if you'd accept a patch for option #1.

Gerhard
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