[Python-Dev] disable writing .py[co]

[Christopher Blunck]

Personally I would like to see py have the ability to *not* generate .pyc files.
99% of the time generation of .pyc doesn't make much difference to me, but there
are times where you simply cannot generate them.  For example . . .

TiVo consists of 4 partitions:
  - primary root    (ro)
  - primary /var    (rw)
  - secondary root  (ro)
  - secondary /var  (rw)

The idea is that with / mounted ro, the box can never fargle itself to the 
point where a user issued fsck is required.  This is pretty sweet for devices
where the consumer has no idea that an actual Linux OS (or *any* OS for that
matter) is installed.  

I made an unsuccessful attempt to load python onto my TiVo, but when I realized
the ro nature of the / filesystem it forced me to reconsider my entire effort.

Likewise, another project of mine is on a rackmount device, and we've briefly
talked about making / ro in order to achieve the same safety: we don't want
the discuss fargled so badly that a customer calls us up and we step them 
through a fsck.  Likewise, we *use* py on our box.  Thus, forcing the 
interpretter to *not* generate .pyc would be a benefit to us, as it would
allow us to improve the stability of our platform.

Just my 2 cents.
-c


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