plugins using cvs/distutils?

[Sebastian "lunar" Wiesner]

Deacon <deacon.sweeney at gmail.com>:

> Hi. I have an open-source application development environment that I
> would like to enable an automated package download system for (like
> downloadable plugins), using sourceforge as its repository. My
> software will have a menu-based popup window, that will list the
> packages (Applications) available through the project distribution
> page. If a user selects a package from this window, it should be
> automatically retrieved and installed by the development environment.
> My software already has a system for automatically recognizing and
> deploying new packages, so I'm only asking for help with distribution
> logistics, I think.
> 
> I'm thinking that I will use the built-in ftplib to list and retrieve
> the files (but I'm not sure yet where to look), and then the distutils
> should probably be used in a standardized manner to actually install
> the packages, right? I've established a CVS, but I'm not aware of any
> built-in-python tools for managing the CVS, and I would rather not add
> any new user-has-to-download-dependencies for this. Is there an easier
> or alternative advisable approach? I have a linux box, should I be
> using it to build all of the platform versions? Any advice would be
> much appreciated, this is my first distribution project
> (sourceforge.net/projects/spade).

I'd use setuptools entrypoints.  This takes the task of plugin discovery
from you, as this is done by setuptools, and allows you to utilize
pypi/easy_install for plugin distribution.

-- 
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