[Python-Dev] Product function patch [issue 1093]

[Robert Kern]

Guido van Rossum wrote:
> On 9/4/07, Steven H. Rogers <steve at shrogers.com> wrote:
>> Guido van Rossum wrote:
>>> I still don't see why the standard library needs to be weighed down
>>> with a competitor to numpy. Including a subset of numpy was considered
>>> in the past, but it's hard to decide on the right subset. In the end
>>> it was decided that numpy is too big to become a standard library.
>>> Given all the gyrations it has gone through I definitely believe this
>>> was the right decision.
>> A competitor to NumPy would be counter-productive, but including a core
>> subset in the standard library that NumPy could be built upon would add
>> valuable functionality to Python out of the box.  It was probably the
>> best decision to not include NumPy when it was previously considered,
>> but I think it should be reconsidered for Python 3.x.  While defining
>> the right subset to include has it's difficulties, I believe it can be
>> done.  What would be a reasonable target size for inclusion in the
>> standard library?
> 
> What makes 3.0 so special? Additions to the stdlib can be considered
> at any feature release.

The 3.x compatibility break (however alleviated by 2to3) makes a nice clean
cutoff. The numpy that works on Pythons 3.x would essentially be a port from the
current numpy. Consequently, we could modify the numpy for Pythons 3.x to always
rely on the stdlib API to build on top of. We couldn't do that for the version
targeted to Pythons 2.x because we could only rely on its presence for 2.6+. I
don't mind maintaining two versions of numpy, one for Python 2.x and one for
3.x, but I don't care to maintain three.

I invite Greg and Steven and whoever else is interested to discuss ideas for the
PEP on numpy-discussion. I'm skeptical, seeing what currently has been
suggested, but some more details could easily allay that.

  http://projects.scipy.org/mailman/listinfo/numpy-discussion

-- 
Robert Kern

"I have come to believe that the whole world is an enigma, a harmless enigma
 that is made terrible by our own mad attempt to interpret it as though it had
 an underlying truth."
  -- Umberto Eco