[Python-Dev] [PEPs] Rebooting PEP 394 (aka Support the /usr/bin/python2 symlink upstream)

[Kerrick Staley]

On Mon, Jul 18, 2011 at 3:03 AM, Ned Deily <nad at acm.org> wrote:
> I think adding the requirement to mandate hard link vs soft link usage
> is an unnecessary and unwarranted attempt at optimization.  For
> instance, IIRC, the OS X installers don't use any hard links: that may
> complicate the install, plus hard links on OS X HFS* file systems are a
> bit of a kludge and not necessarily more efficient than symlinks.   It's
> not a big deal but perhaps the wording should be changed to make a
> suggestion about hard links vs syminks rather than mandate which should
> be used.

Ah, OK. The wording's been changed so that symbolic links will be
installed on Mac OS X and hard links elsewhere (although maybe
symbolic links are also better on certain other platforms; I'm not
sure).

I do think that specific instructions must be given (rather than just
a suggestion) because it's indicating what must be done to CPython.
The instructions *should* be as close as possible to what the
installer already does, but I'm not entirely sure what the installer
does by default, and the hard-link recommendation was based off a
cursory inspection of my own system, so further input from yourself
and the rest of python-dev would be appreciated.

Nick, can you please apply the patch (will be sent in the following
email) to the PEP SVN as soon as we get the hard-link issue is figured
out? Alternatively, could you provide me write access to just the
pep-0394.txt file so I can update it myself? Thanks.

-Kerrick Staley