[Python-Dev] logging package -- spurious package contents

[Guido van Rossum]

I have another issue with the logging package.

The submodule logging/config.py contains code that I feel should not
be there.  I experimented with the config file format it implements,
and it appears very painful.  It appears mostly undocumented, typos in
the file are not always reported, and you seem to have to specify the
filename and mode twice.  (Example:

    [handler_normal]
    class=FileHandler
    level=NOTSET
    formatter=common
    args=('z3.log', 'a')                   <----\
    filename=z3.log                        <---- >- this is ugly
    mode=a                                 <----/

.)

Since configuring the logging package with a few programmatic calls is
so easy, and applications that need serious logging configurability
typically already have some configuration mechanism, I propose to drop
this from the Python distribution.

I'm similarly not convinced of the utility of the logging/handlers.py
submodule, but I've never tried to use it, so lacking any particular
negative experience all I can say against it is YAGNI.

Does anyone on python-dev think the logging package would lose utility
if I removed those submodules?

--Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/)