[Python-Dev] Magic main functions

[Phillip J. Eby]

At 07:06 AM 10/15/04 +1000, Nick Coghlan wrote:
>Barry Warsaw wrote:
>>On Thu, 2004-10-14 at 10:04, Bob Ippolito wrote:
>>
>>>>+1.  Also, if a non-dotted module name can't be found, pyrun should be
>>>>called to see if the module is actually a package (with an __main__ that
>>>>lives in the package's __init__.py).
>
>Actually, if we were going to do something for packages, I'd be more 
>inclined to look for a script called __main__.py in the package directory, 
>rather than looking for a __main__ function inside __init__.py. Or else 
>simply run __init__.py itself as __main__ (i.e. allow the use of the 
>existing 'Python main' idiom inside a package's __init__.py)
>
>(Interestingly, that's at least the second time it has been suggested to 
>turn this idea into 'C-like main functions for Python'. '-m' is about 
>another way to invoke the current 'if __name__ == "__main__":' idiom. It 
>is most definitely *not* about creating a new idiom for main functions - 
>an activity which would seem to be PEP-worthy)

Perhaps this means that -m is premature?  I personally would rather wait 
for 2.5 if it means we get a nice, future-proof "main" convention out of 
the deal.  While -m would not then be "backward compatible" with existing 
scripts, people could start changing scripts to match the convention as 
soon as there was an accepted PEP.