[Python-Dev] Distutils and Distribute roadmap (and some words on Virtualenv, Pip)

[David Cournapeau]

On Wed, Oct 21, 2009 at 5:49 AM, Paul Moore <p.f.moore at gmail.com> wrote:
> 2009/10/20 Chris Withers <chris at simplistix.co.uk>:
>> I wouldn't have a problem if integrating with the windows package manager
>> was an optional extra, but I think it's one of many types of package
>> management that need to be worried about, so might be easier to get the
>> others working and let anyone who wants anything beyond a pure-python
>> packaging system that works across platforms, regardless of whether binary
>> extensions are needed, do the work themselves...
>
> There are many (I believe) Windows users for whom bdist_wininst is
> just what they want. For those people, where's the incentive to switch
> in what you propose? You're not providing the features they currently
> have, and frankly "do the work yourself" is no answer (not everyone
> can, often for entirely legitimate reasons).

I am not so familiar with msi or wininst internals, but isn't it
possible to install w.r.t. a given prefix ? Basically, making it
possible to use a wininst in a virtualenv if required (in which case I
guess it would not register with the windows db - at least it should
be possible to disable it).

The main problem with bdist_wininst installers is that they don't work
with setuptools dependency stuff (at least, that's the reason given by
windows users for a numpy egg on windows, whereas we used to only
provide an exe). But you could argue it is a setuptools pb as much as
a wininst pb, I guess.

David