[Pythonmac-SIG] MacPython-OS9 2.3a1 available

[Jack Jansen]

MacPython-OS9 2.3a1 (the successor to MacPython 2.2) is available via 
http://www.cwi.nl/~jack/macpython.html and you are all cordially 
invited to try it out!

Actually: if a Python on OS8.6 or OS9 or a CFM-Python on OSX is 
important to you'd better test it, I've moved almost completely to OSX 
so this distribution has seen very little testing, and the same will be 
true for the next releases.

As usual I will wait another day before I send this note to a wider 
audience, so please report showstopper bugs ASAP.

Here are main the Mac-specific changes, see :Misc:NEWS in the 
distribution for more:
- The current naming convention for Python on the Macintosh is that 
MacPython
   refers to the unix-based OSX-only version, and MacPython-OS9 refers 
to the
   CFM-based version that runs on both OS9 and OSX.

- All MacPython-OS9 functionality is now available in an OSX unix build,
   including the Carbon modules, the IDE, OSA support, etc. A lot of this
   will only work correctly in a framework build, though, because you 
cannot
   talk to the window manager unless your application is run from a .app
   bundle. There is a command line tool "pythonw" that runs your script
   with an interpreter living in such a .app bundle, this interpreter 
should
   be used to run any Python script using the window manager (including
   Tkinter or wxPython scripts).

- Most of Mac/Lib has moved to Lib/plat-mac, which is again used both in
   MacPython-OSX and MacPython-OS9. The only modules remaining in Mac/Lib
   are specifically for MacPython-OS9 (CFM support, preference 
resources, etc).

- MacPython-OS9 is now Carbon-only, so it runs on Mac OS 9 or Mac OS X 
and
   possibly on Mac OS 8.6 with the right CarbonLib installed, but not on 
earlier
   releases.

- All the Carbon classes are now PEP253 compliant, meaning that you can
   subclass them from Python. Most of the attributes have gone, you 
should
   now use the accessor function call API, which is also what Apple's
   documentation uses. Some attributes such as grafport.visRgn are still
   available for convenience.

- New Carbon modules File (implementing the APIs in Files.h and 
Aliases.h)
   and Folder (APIs from Folders.h). The old macfs builtin module is
   gone, and replaced by a Python wrapper around the new modules.

- New Carbon modules Help and AH give access to the Carbon Help Manager.
   There are hooks in the IDE to allow accessing the Python documentation
   (and Apple's Carbon and Cocoa documentation) through the Help Viewer.
   See Mac/OSX/README for converting the Python documentation to a
   Help Viewer comaptible form and installing it.

- OSA support has been redesigned and the generated Python classes now
   mirror the inheritance defined by the underlying OSA classes.

- MacPython no longer maps both \r and \n to \n on input for any text 
file.
   This feature has been replaced by universal newline support (PEP278).

- The default encoding for Python sourcefiles in MacPython-OS9 is no 
longer
   mac-roman (or whatever your local Mac encoding was but "ascii", like 
on
   other platforms. If you really need sourcefiles with Mac characters 
in them
   you can change this in site.py.

--
- Jack Jansen        <Jack.Jansen@oratrix.com>        
http://www.cwi.nl/~jack -
- If I can't dance I don't want to be part of your revolution -- Emma 
Goldman -