[Python-Dev] Deprecating modules (python-dev summary for early Dec, 2004)

[Skip Montanaro]

    Jim> Would it make sense to add an attic (or even "deprecated")
    Jim> directory to the end of sys.path, and move old modules there?  This
    Jim> would make the search for non-deprecated modules a bit faster, and
    Jim> would make it easier to verify that new code isn't depending
    Jim> (perhaps indirectly) on any deprecated features.

That's what lib-old is for.  All people have to do is append it to sys.path
to get access to its contents:

    % python
    Python 2.5a0 (#72, Jan 20 2005, 20:14:27) 
    [GCC 3.3 20030304 (Apple Computer, Inc. build 1493)] on darwin
    Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
    >>> import glob
    >>> for f in glob.glob("/Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/*.py"):
    ...   print f
    ... 
    /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/addpack.py
    /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/cmp.py
    /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/cmpcache.py
    /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/codehack.py
    /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/dircmp.py
    /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/dump.py
    /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/find.py
    /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/fmt.py
    /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/grep.py
    /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/lockfile.py
    /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/newdir.py
    /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/ni.py
    /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/packmail.py
    /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/Para.py
    /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/poly.py
    /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/rand.py
    /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/statcache.py
    /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/tb.py
    /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/tzparse.py
    /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/util.py
    /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/whatsound.py
    /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/whrandom.py
    /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.5/lib-old/zmod.py

That doesn't help for deprecated extension modules, but I think they are
much less frequently candidates for deprecation.

Skip