[Python-Dev] BDFL delegation for PEP 426 (PyPI metadata 1.3)

[PJ Eby]

On Sun, Feb 3, 2013 at 8:08 AM, Nick Coghlan <ncoghlan at gmail.com> wrote:
> The rationale for the distutils freeze is "don't break setuptools".
> That rationale still holds.

IIRC, the historical issue that triggered the freeze was not that the
distutils refactoring broke setuptools, but that it did so in what was
supposed to be a bugfix-only release of Python, via a change to what
appeared to be a public/documented method.

This rationale doesn't apply to major/minor releases of Python, and
the freeze was only supposed to apply to 2.x in any event.  (IIRC,
some of the breakage was the result of backporting 3.x distutils
changes to 2.x.)

Anyway, adding features or refactoring distutils is not the problem:
doing it in bugfix releases is.  With normal releases, third-party
extenders of distutils at least have the opportunity to test and issue
updates in a timely fashion.