[Python-ideas] Draft PEP for virtualenv in the stdlib

[Konstantin Zemlyak]

Carl Meyer wrote:

 > Vinay Sajip and I are working on a PEP for making "virtual Python
 > environments" a la virtualenv [1] a built-in feature of Python 3.3.

 > This idea was first proposed on python-dev by Ian Bicking in February
 > 2010 [2]. It was revived at PyCon 2011 and has seen discussion on
 > distutils-sig [3] and more recently again on python-dev [4] [5].

This will be a very nice feature to have indeed.

I've got some questions after reading the draft:

1) There is no mention whatsoever about user site-packages directories 
from PEP-370.

Should they be supported inside venvs? Or should they be considered part 
of system-wide python?

2) virtualenv keeps using platform-specific layout inside venv. So on 
POSIX for example this allows to install different python versions and 
implementations (like cpython and pypy, for example) into the very same 
venv. OTOH on Windows and in Jython there is only <prefix>\Lib per venv 
which makes this sharing impossible.

Should venvs support such use case? If so, how shebangs should be 
handled? What layout to endorse?

3) This might be not relevant to this PEP but I wonder how would 
implementing this proposal affect other implementations like Jython, 
PyPy and IronPython. Will they be able to implement this functionality 
the same way?

-- 
Konstantin Zemlyak