pychecker proposal

[Nick Jacobson]

anton at vredegoor.doge.nl (Anton Vredegoor) wrote in message news:<4096d906$0$145$3a628fcd at reader1.nntp.hccnet.nl>...
> nicksjacobson at yahoo.com (Nick Jacobson) wrote:
> 
> >I think that PyChecker should be part of the "batteries included"
> >library that comes with Python.  It can be a very useful tool for
> >catching errors and bad style.
> 
> Here are a few thoughts on this.
> 
> a) How often will it be used by how many people?
> 
> While I acknowledge PyCheckers usefulness, I tend not to use it very
> often. Maybe I should use it more, or maybe Pythons executable pseudo
> code quality forces PyChecker to fall in the "below 1% of use cases"
> category.
> 

I can't speak for others, but I run every piece of code of mine
through it.  It's a safety net for typos.  It explains certain bugs
before I have to figure them out.  And if nothing else, I configured
it to tell me to put in doc strings, which comes up all the time.

> b) Is it actively supported by people that are willing to release it
> synchronously with Pythons updates?
> 

Well, that might be a bit of a deal-breaker.

> c) Is its license compatible with Python?
> 

Not sure, but from the website,
"We believe that code should be as bug-free as possible.  We believe
this so strongly, that we make tools freely available to help
programmers develop more robust systems."

> d) Are there other packages that should be included which have more
> urgency or that would be a better tradeoff for adding to the space
> that a Python standard distribution takes?
> 
> Pychecker is not a very big package, which would be an argument in
> favor of including it. 
> 

Right, it's not very big.  If there are other packages that are more
important, that's OK.  But IMO PyChecker belongs in the "to be added"
queue.

> OTOH, some time ago I was at an Apple Itunes demonstration. I was
> happy to immediately start a Python shell on a mac, but I also noticed
> the conspicuous absence of an impressive Python demo. 
> 
> It would be a really good idea to include a (PyGame) demo like
> solarwolf in the standard distribution. Not because it would be used
> very often but because it would add substantially to the "out of the
> box experience" which is crucial for acquiring new customers.
> 
> IMO this alone would outweigh even the disadvantage of adding a few
> megabytes to Pythons standard distribution and the disadvantage of
> making it look less "serious" by associating it with games.
> 

I think this deserves its own thread :)

> e) Anything not mentioned above:-)
> 
> Anton