adding the XML to 2.0 to be a mistake?

[Martin von Loewis]

Paul Prescod <paulp at ActiveState.com> writes:

> I agree with this. I don't think that minidom should have an existence
> independent of Python. The PyXML minidom should be phased out. 

Not sure what you mean here. If your proposal is to remove minidom
from PyXML: that won't work.

> The only reason it was not is because some people still use it with
> older versions of Python.

No, this is not a reason.

When the xml package was incorporated into Python 2, I implemented a
scheme where PyXML and the core xml packages would be merged, by
playing tricks with the package __path__.

This solution was rejected in favour of the _xmlplus approach. In that
approach, PyXML must provide a superset of the core xml package; that
is part of the contract between Python and PyXML. Therefore, minidom
and pulldom must continue to exist in PyXML.

That the versions temporarily differ is a convenience to the PyXML
maintainer: it is easier to modify PyXML, release it, get it tested,
and only integrate the changes into Python when they have been
verified.

> I don't know what you mean by saying that PyXML is "tied to Python."
> PyXML depends on Python, just as PIL and NumPy do.

I agree it is a stronger relationship: PyXML promises not to break
applications that work without it. Mere presence of PIL and NumPy
normally cannot break applications (unless the application uses the
same module names as PIL or NumPy); mere presence of PyXML could more
easily break applications - it is the responsibility of the PyXML
maintainer to make sure that this does not happen.

Regards,
Martin