[Python-ideas] size of the installation of Python on mobile devices

[Nick Coghlan]

On 30 July 2016 at 22:29, M.-A. Lemburg <mal at egenix.com> wrote:
> IMO, this should all be left to packagers. They will have to
> patch the code base anyway to get things working in such
> an environment, so there isn't much point in adding some
> bits to the configure script which everyone uses, while
> leaving out other important parts. This doesn't simplify
> the life of packagers much, but does add maintenance
> overhead for the core developers (since these new options
> would have to be tested as well before release).
>
> BTW: By not having these options in configure, you also
> gain a lot more freedom as packager, since you can have
> the build behave you would like it to instead of going
> through the whole change request discussion process that
> updates/changes to these options would entail going
> forward.

Encouraging that divergence isn't free, though - it just pushes the
testing burden outward by creating a larger compatibility testing
matrix for folks wanting to support sourceless environments.

And, to be clear, I'm not suggesting we start making official
sourceless releases of CPython, nor am I suggesting we make
"sourceless builds are working" a gating criterion for versioned
releases - instead, I'm suggesting we allow interested folks like
Xavier to add the basic knobs and dials to the standard distribution,
with the awareness that they might break sometimes and requiring
patching after other folks make changes. Since the assumption is that
folks interested in this will be building from source anyway, it
shouldn't be a problem to run directly off a maintenance branch when
they need to, rather than using a particular release tag.

Cheers,
NIck.

-- 
Nick Coghlan   |   ncoghlan at gmail.com   |   Brisbane, Australia