[Pythonmac-SIG] Python Universal packages- how can I help

[Jordan Mantha]

Bob Ippolito wrote:
> 
> On Apr 7, 2006, at 5:25 PM, Jordan Mantha wrote:
> 
>>     Ok, so I recently got my first mac, an Intel iMac (17") for work.
>> So far I have been totally impressed. I really enjoy OSX and starting
>> to get into Python more.  However, I'm starting to feel bad that I
>> have this thing and I'm not helping with testing/building Universal
>> packages for other people to enjoy. I'm particularly interested in
>> scientific python packages (scipy and friends, matplotlib, pyx, etc.)
>> and wxpython. Is there a general place to find tutorials or something
>> on creating Universal python packages? I'd like to help fill in
>> http://pythonmac.org/wiki/UniversalPackages if I can. How would I go
>> about doing that?
> 
> The packages on that list are "unfriendly" in that they will not
> trivially compile universally.  Getting those packages up to universal
> snuff is probably best left for the people who are already familiar with
> the peculiarities of those packages and the nuances of OS X porting and
> universal binaries.  Most other packages should compile trivially out of
> the box.
> 
> However, if you have a LOT of free time on your hands and you're
> interested in the ugly details you'll want to read up on:
> 1. the lipo command
> 2. the -arch and -isysroot flags to cc
> 2. the -syslibroot and -arch flags to ld.
> 
> The universal build ships with a Makefile that tells distutils what to
> do, but anything with external dependencies will need those dependencies
> compiled by hand with custom environment variables to produce a
> universal static or dynamic library out of them.  Sometimes it's
> trivial, other times not (especially if it does something stupid like
> endian or CPU detection at ./configure time) and you may have to compile
> PPC then i386 and lipo the result together (which may require a separate
> machine for each architecture).
>

Thanks for the info. I'll try to check those points. The universal
builds sound a bit scary, which is probably the reason they aren't all
over the place. I would assume creating Intel-only packages is easier,
is that right? Can bdist_mpkg (and py2app for that matter) be used on
Intel macs with the Universal Python 2.4.3 build? I'd like to learn how
to use bdist_mpkg and py2app. I'm having a bit of trouble figuring where
various packages are when it comes to Intel compatibility. Would making
.mpkgs be a more realistic goal? Sorry if my questions are seeming
silly. I'm used to building from source for myself and Linux packaging.

-Jordan Mantha