[Python-Dev] Python 3 as a Default in Linux Distros

[Gustavo Carneiro]

On Wed, Jul 24, 2013 at 6:04 PM, Terry Reedy <tjreedy at udel.edu> wrote:

> On 7/24/2013 5:12 AM, Bohuslav Kabrda wrote:
>
>> Hi all, in recent days, there has been a discussion on fedora-devel
>> (see thread [1]) about moving to Python 3 as a default.
>>
>
> Default-shift is a known natural language phenomenon.
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/**Retronym<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Retronym>
> It is inevitably messy in the middle. Even worse for us, "Python' is both
> a natural and artificial language term and the default meaning will not
> necessarily be synchronized across the two domains.
>
> Not being a current *nix user, I have no opinion on the specific
> alternatives. However, I am concerned about newcomers being mis-served by
> being mislead into thinking that 'Python' is python 2 rather python 3. We
> see this in some newbie posts on Python list. (This is especially a concern
> when default Python is still, say, 2.5.)  I have no idea, though, how to
> avoid breaking scripts while directing newcomers in the proper direction.


+1

Maybe we could make interactive python2 scripts print a big warning
advising users to use python 3 instead of 2, if possible?  I mean, if
stdout is a TTY.  This way, even if 'python' is python2, newbies will see
the warning.  I think every developer (newbie or not) sooner or later will
try a python interactive shell, and so will see the warning.  It is
important also for experienced python developers to be told explicitly that
they should be thinking about switching to python 3, at some point.



>
>
> --
> Terry Jan Reedy
>
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-- 
Gustavo J. A. M. Carneiro
"The universe is always one step beyond logic." -- Frank Herbert
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