[Python-Dev] why is not 64-bit installer the default download link for Windows?

[Glenn Linderman]

On 7/10/2018 11:14 PM, Stephen J. Turnbull wrote:
> Ivan Pozdeev via Python-Dev writes:
>
>   > "One or more issues caused the setup to fail. Please fix the issues and
>   > the retry setup. For more information see the log file <hypelink>.
>   >
>   > 0x80070661 - This installation package is not supported by this
>   > processor type. Contact your product vendor."
>   >
>   > Pretty descriptive in my book.
>
> Experience shows that's definitely not descriptive enough for my
> university's students (and starting from AY 2021 we're moving to
> Python 3 as the university-wide programming course language, yay!)
> They have no idea that "processor type" means "word size", or what
> alternative package to look for.  Sometimes they take the "contact
> vendor" wording to mean "package is broken".  I don't think the
> Japanese or Chinese students will have 32-bit machines (haven't seen
> one among my advisees since March 2016), but we do get some students
> from less wealthy countries who may be using older machines.
>
> So I think it would be really nice if the installer detects the
> wordsize mismatch, and issues an explicit message like
>
>      This package is intended for a 64-it machine, but yours is a 32-bit
>      machine.
>
>      Please download and install the package specifically for 32-bit
>      machines instead.
Which would be far, far better, regardless of which bitness(es) of 
installer is(are) displayed (prominently) on the web site.
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