Inconsistencies between zipfile and tarfile APIs

[Lars Gustäbel]

On Thu, Jul 21, 2011 at 10:58:37PM -0700, rantingrick wrote:
> My hat is off to you Mr. Richardson. I've even considered creating my
> own clean versions of these two modules, because heck, it is not that
> difficult to do! However we must stop fixing these warts on a local
> level Corey. We MUST clean up this damn python stdlib once and for
> all.

One could get the impression that you are leading a grass-roots movement
fighting a big faceless corporation. Instead, what you're dealing with is this
warm and friendly Python community you could as well be a part of if you are a
reasonable guy and write good code.

> I am willing and you are willing; that's two people. However, can we
> convince the powers that be to upgrade these modules? Sure, if we get
> enough people shouting for it to happen they will notice. So come on
> people make your voices heard. Chime in and let the devs know we are
> ready to unite and tackle these problems in our stdlib.

Yeah, great. Please write code. Or a PEP.

> What this community needs (first and foremost) is some positive
> attitudes. If you don't want to write the code fine. But at least
> chime in and say... "Hey guys, that's a good idea! I would like to see
> some of these APIs cleaned up too. good luck! +1"

+1

> Now, even if we get one hundred people chanting... "Yes, Yes, Fix This
> Mess!"... i know Guido and company are going to frown because of
> backwards incompatibility. But let me tell you something people, the
> longer we put off these changes the more painful they are going to
> be.

And backwards compatibility is bad why? Tell me, what exactly is your view
towards this? Should there be none?

> Python 3000 would have been the perfect time to introduce a more
> intuitive and unified zip/tar archive module however that did not
> happen. So now we need to think about adding a duplicate module
> "archive.py" and deprecating zipfile.py and tarfile.py. We can remove
> the old modules when Python 4000 rolls out.
> 
> That's just step one people, we have a long way to go!

archive.py is no new idea. Unfortunately, to this day, nobody had the time to
come up with an implementation.

Let me say it again: less false pathos, more code. Please.

-- 
Lars Gustäbel
lars at gustaebel.de

To a man with a hammer, everything looks like a nail.
(Mark Twain)