[Python-Dev] Python startup time

Brett Cannon brett at python.org
Sun Jul 23 13:36:56 EDT 2017


On Sun, Jul 23, 2017, 00:53 Michel Desmoulin, <desmoulinmichel at gmail.com>
wrote:

>
>
> > Optimizing startup time is incredibly valuable,
>
> I've been reading that from the beginning of this thread but I've been
> using python since the 2.4 and I never felt the burden of the startup time.
>
> I'm guessing a lot of people are like me, they just don't express them
> self because "better startup time can't be bad so let's not put a
> barrier on this".
>
> I'm not against it, but since the necessity of a faster Python in
> general has been a debate for years and is only finally catching up with
> the work of Victor Stinner, can somebody explain me the deal with start
> up time ?
>
> I understand where it can improve your lives. I just don't get why it's
> suddenly such an explosion of expectations and needs.
>

It's actually always been something we have tried to improve, it just comes
in waves. For instance we occasionally re-examine what modules get pulled
in during startup. Importlib was optimized to help with startup. This just
happens to be the latest round of trying to improve the situation.

As for why we care, every command-line app wants to at least appear faster
if not be faster because just getting to the point of being able to e.g.
print a version number is dominated by Python and app start-up. And this is
not guessing; I work with a team that puts out a command line app and one
of the biggest complaints they get is the startup time.

-brett

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