Project source code layout?

[Lawrence D'Oliveiro]

In message <mailman.1112.1244128369.8015.python-list at python.org>, Allen 
Fowler wrote:

> 1) Do you use virtualpython?

No idea what that is.

> 2) How do you load the modules in your lib directory?

At the beginning of my scripts, I have a sequence like

    test_mode = False # True for testing, False for production

    if test_mode :
        home_dir = "/home/shop-test"
    else :
        home_dir = "/home/shop"
    #end if

    sys.path.append(home_dir + "/lib")

    import common
    [etc]

I have an installation script that looks for that "test_mode = True/False" 
assignment and edits it accordingly. That flag is used to select the top-
level directory (as above) as well as the database name, etc. This allows me 
to run two complete parallel sets of code and data, so I can mess around 
with the testing version without impacting the production system.

> 3) How do you reference your configuration directives from within your
> modules and CGI/daemon scripts?

For my last project using the above system, I used XML as the config file 
format.