[Python-Dev] How to test for stuff like fsync?

[Guido van Rossum]

> In this specific case, it would have triggered a false alarm on some
> systems. I rewrote the test for fsync to overcome a build problem on
> some system, where fsync was present in the library, but not present
> in the header files. Since we are taking fsync's address, this causes
> a compile-time problem. So it *is* intentional that fsync is now gone
> for systems on which it was previously (2.2) present. (More
> specifically, fsync might disappear on systems that cannot stand
> _XOPEN_SOURCE being defined)

I don't like this.  We're not taking fsync's address for a very good
reason, just to save some code duplication.  Removing fsync from
those platforms just because our code-saving trick doesn't work there
doesn't strike me as good service for those platforms.

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