[Python-Dev] Fwd: PEP 426 is now the draft spec for distribution metadata 2.0

[Steven D'Aprano]

On 20/02/13 11:54, Fred Drake wrote:
> On Tue, Feb 19, 2013 at 6:19 PM, Donald Stufft<donald.stufft at gmail.com>  wrote:
>> Let's not add anything to the stdlib till it has real world usage. Doing
>> otherwise is putting the cart before the horse.
>
> I'd posit that anything successful will no longer need to be added to
> the standard
> library, to boot.  Packaging hasn't done well there.
>
> I'd rather see a successful packaging story develop than bundle it into the
> standard library.  The later just isn't that interesting any more.


I keep hearing people say that the stdlib is not important, but I don't think
that is true. There are lots of people who have problems with anything not in
the standard library.

- Beginners often have difficulty (due to inexperience, lack of confidence or
   knowledge) in *finding*, let alone installing and using, packages that aren't
   in the standard library.

- To people in the Linux world, adding anything outside of your distro's
   packaging system is a nuisance. No matter how easy your packaging library
   makes it, you now have two sorts of packages: first-class packages that
   your distro will automatically update for you, and second-class ones that
   aren't.

- People working in restrictive corporate systems often have to jump through
   flaming hoops before installing software.


Packages in the stdlib are a no-brainer. Anything outside the stdlib has
additional barriers to use, even if installing them is as simple as
"some-package-manager install spam.py".


For the avoidance of doubt, this is *not* a veiled request for "everything"
to be in the stdlib, since that is impractical and stupid, just a reminder
that the stdlib is still important and that no matter how easy packaging
becomes, it will never be as easy as having something already there.



-- 
Steven