Working group for Python CPAN-equivalence?

[Ben Finney]

Olof Bjarnason <olof.bjarnason at gmail.com> writes:

> Hi everybody!
>
> The "Where is CPAN for Python?" question keeps popping up, with
> answers ranging from "There is no CPAN for Python" and "We already
> have CPAN for Python" (confusing).

Caused in no small measure by the fact that Perl people mean at least
two distinct things by “Where is CPAN for Python?”:

* The central package registry, CPAN, with metadata in a standard
  queryable format, and all registered packages redundantly mirrored and
  available for installation at user-specified versions.

  We have an equivalent in PyPI, though it's incomplete since many
  *registered* packages are not actually hosted *at* PyPI.

* The command-line tool, ‘cpan’, used for performing operations on the
  set of locally-installed Perl packages, and for package maintainers
  performing operations on the repository.

  We have nothing like this. The Distutils library does a small part of
  the job, and the third-party ‘easy_install’ program works for those
  which use the Setuptools extensions; but there's nothing at all
  equivalent to Perl's ‘cpan’ tool.

Often, Perl people asking simply “Where is CPAN for Python?” are asking
about a third thing:

* The unified, mature, actively-maintained, seamless combination of the
  CPAN repository and the ‘cpan’ tool, that work together as a single
  reliable system to such an extent that one can sensibly talk about
  them *both* as one thing, “CPAN”.

  This one we're a *long* way from with Python, IMO. Much work has been
  going on over the last year or so, and it's encouraging to see; but so
  much of that work is dealing with the legacy burden of Distutils that
  I get weary seeing how far there is to go.

-- 
 \         “A child of five could understand this. Fetch me a child of |
  `\                                              five.” —Groucho Marx |
_o__)                                                                  |
Ben Finney