[Python-Dev] Integrate BeautifulSoup into stdlib?

[Ben Finney]

"Martin v. Löwis" <martin at v.loewis.de> writes:

> I see this as a consequence of Web 2.0, and open source: Publish
> early, publish often, make the pieces you publish as tiny as
> possible to maximize reuse :-(

I'm all in favour of re-use. But re-use should mean having the library
in a *single* predictable location (per declared version) on the
system, so that any code that needs it can declare the dependency and
find it there, and so that bugs in the library only need to be found
and fixed in *one* place.

> If people invent a new marshaling format every year (XML-RPC, SOAP,
> JSON, YAML, ...), you *have* to use a just-published library to
> follow the hype curve.

That's still no reason why that new version of the library can't be
installed to a central, predictable location.

> If you have been raised in this tradition, you are shocked by the
> number of modules in the Python library, and wish for this dinosaur
> to die.

It's more shocking to realise that there are even *more* libraries
installed privately by applications, where they can't be easily found
and fixed by a single update of the library.

-- 
 \      “The process by which banks create money is so simple that the |
  `\     mind is repelled.” —John Kenneth Galbraith, _Money: Whence It |
_o__)                                       Came, Where It Went_, 1975 |
Ben Finney