[Python-Dev] Maintaining old releases

[M.-A. Lemburg]

On 2008-08-13 04:57, Guido van Rossum wrote:
>> And there's a reason for this slow uptake of Python 2.5: as more
>> and more servers run 64-bit OSes, the Py_ssize_t changes cause
>> serious trouble with Python C extensions that were not updated
>> by their authors.
> 
> I'm not sure what that has to do with anything. The older releases
> have *worse* support for 64-bit platforms!

This is one of the reasons why porting applications from 2.4 to 2.5
takes longer than e.g. moving from 2.3 to 2.4.

Python 2.4 works just fine on 64-bit platforms and so do the C
extensions that were written for it. Moving to 2.5 you often find
that those C extensions do not support the new Py_ssize_t types
and thus generate segfaults.

As a result, you either have to start using a different C extension,
patch the extension, stay with Python 2.4 or use a custom Python
interpreter that is patched always map Py_ssize_t to int.

The move from 2.5 to 2.6 will be a lot easier and uptake a lot
faster.

-- 
Marc-Andre Lemburg
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