[Python-Dev] setuptools: past, present, future

[Giovanni Bajo]

Phillip J. Eby <pje at telecommunity.com> wrote:

> What *should* happen now instead, is a plan for merging setuptools
> into the distutils for 2.6.  That includes making the decisions about
> what "install" and "sdist" should do, and whether backward
> compatibility of internal behaviors should be implicit or explicit.

+1.

> Between 2.5 and 2.6, setuptools should continue to be developed in the
> sandbox, and keep the name 'setuptools'.  For 2.6, however, we should
> merge
> the code bases and have setuptools just be an alias.  Or, perhaps
> what is
> now called setuptools should be called "distutils2" and distributed as
> such, with "setuptools" only being a legacy name.  But regardless,
> the plan
> should be to have only one codebase for 2.6, and to issue backported
> releases of that codebase for at least Python 2.4 and 2.5.

+1.

> One final item that is a possibility: we could leave pkg_resources in
> for 2.5, and add its documentation.  This would allow people to begin
> using its API to check for installed packages, accessing resources, etc.
> I'd be interested in hearing folks' opinions about that, one way or the
> other.


This would be good. I believe pkg_resources is useful in 2.5 and in no way it
represents a not properly integrated layer of additional functionalities (like
setuptools is to distutils now). If you sincerely believe that pkg_resources'
API is mature enough, I don't see any reason for keeping it off 2.5.

Thanks for your hard work!

Giovanni Bajo