[Python-Dev] Open issues for 2.4.1

[Robey Pointer]

Anthony Baxter wrote:

>So here's a list of open items I'm thinking about for the 2.4.1
>release.
>
>  - os.access handling unicode filenames
>    I'm still thinking over whether this is going to cause more problems
>    for people who find it works for some Python 2.4 and not others. I'm
>    leaning towards saying that this is a bug fix, but I'd appreciate any 
>    comments (pro or con). If no-one comments, I'll go with whatever my
>    gut feeling says is the right answer.
>  
>

(I've been lurking for a while but this is my first post.  I maintain 
paramiko and enjoy harrassing people on sourceforge to fix the new-style 
Exception bug that vexes me.  Nice to meet you all.) :)

I agree 100% with the arguments made over the past couple of weeks about 
strictly refusing to add new features to micro releases (like 2.4.1).  
But I don't think fixing the os.access bug is anything but a bug fix, 
and here's my rationale:

It's entirely possible that some python users have worked around this 
bug by special-casing their use of os.access to manually encode the 
filename, but that doesn't mean that bringing os.access behavior in line 
with the other filename methods should be considered a "feature add".  
Pretend there was a bug with "int" such that you could add any number to 
it except 1.  You can work around this bug by replacing "+1" with "+2-1" 
but it doesn't make it any less of a bug or any less important to fix.

In other words, I don't think that the argument "users may have written 
code to work around the bug" is a valid reason to not fix a bug.

robey