[Python-Dev] Support the /usr/bin/python2 symlink upstream

[Piotr Ożarowski]

[Sandro Tosi, 2011-03-02]
> On Wed, Mar 2, 2011 at 13:56, Piotr Ożarowski <piotr at debian.org> wrote:
> > [Sandro Tosi, 2011-03-02]
> >> On Wed, Mar 2, 2011 at 10:01, Piotr Ożarowski <piotr at debian.org> wrote:
> >> > I co-maintain with Matthias a package that provides /usr/bin/python
> >> > symlink in Debian and I can confirm that it will always point to Python
> >> > 2.X. We also do not plan to add /usr/bin/python2 symlink (and I guess
> >> > only accepted PEP can change that)
> >>
> >> Can you please explain why you NACK this proposed change?
> >
> > it encourages people to change /usr/bin/python symlink to point to
> > python3.X which I'm strongly against (how can I tell that upstream
> > author meant python3.X and not python2.X without checking the code?)
> 
> with 'people' do you mean 'users'? if so, isn't this risk already present?

users already break their systems via "sudo ez_install ..." (note the
"sudo" part!), I meant developers (distro and upstream authors).
If a programmer develops a script in Python 3 on Arch and later ships
his file with /usr/bin/python in shebang, it's very likely that this
script will not work on all distributions that didn't (yet?) change the
symlink.

> If you, user, change the python symlink (provided by python-minimal in
> Debian) to something else than what's shipped, it's still a local
> change, and will never be supported; but with python2 *Debian is free*
> to decide if python can be pointed to python3, if the time will come.

... and make other distributions developers' life miserable?
-- 
Piotr Ożarowski                         Debian GNU/Linux Developer
www.ozarowski.pl          www.griffith.cc           www.debian.org
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