Time to bundle PythonWin

[Dave Benjamin]

Ten wrote:
> Respectfully, that sounds like a reason for *you* to bundle pythonwin (and 
> python, to be honest :) ), not a reason for everyone else to have to download 
> an extra 40-50% of potentially superfluous cruft with their standard python 
> setup.

Certainly, I could bundle Python and PythonWin myself. I'll even admit 
that my little office utilities would be better distributed as frozen 
.exe files with all the necessary libraries bundled inside. But my 
original problem as stated was this:

   1. I release a Python script (a .py file)
   2. My user upgrades or switches computers
   3. They (logically) download and install Python
   4. My script still doesn't work
   5. They ask me for help

At this point, I dig through four or five web sites to find where 
PythonWin is hosted these days, and it's obvious that my user never 
would have guessed to download it, or found the right place to retrieve 
it. If the windows installer for Python came with PythonWin, they might 
not have needed my help at all.

I realize that other people's needs aren't the same as mine, but this 
scenario isn't contrived. This has happened numerous times. Bundling 
PythonWin myself wouldn't solve this particular problem as stated.

> In more general terms I can see why it would be useful to some windows people
> to have more winapi stuff available. I can still think of quite a few things 
> I'd rather be spending that extra download time on myself, though, like a 
> sexed-up tkinter or maybe even a new gui toolkit.

I'd happily download a larger installer for any or all of these things. 
In the time it took me to write this, I'd probably already have finished 
the download anyway.

> Still, it's not an either/or choice, I suppose.

Yep. =)

Cheers,
Dave