[Tutor] setup.py "script" vs "console_scripts" Was: if __name__=='main' vs entry points: What to teach new comers?

[eryk sun]

On Fri, Aug 4, 2017 at 10:15 AM, Thomas Güttler
<guettliml at thomas-guettler.de> wrote:
> Am 04.08.2017 um 02:50 schrieb Ben Finney:
>
>> Because Distutils implements only ‘scripts’, and that's not capable
>> enough for what people need so Setuptools implements entry points.
>>
>> In other words: One of them is in the standard library and does
>> something; the other is third-party and can do more.
>>
>> That answers why there are two. But maybe you wanted to ask some
>> underlying question?
>
> The underlaying question is: Imangine you are a newcomer. And there
> are two more choices. You need a guide like 'if unsure do x'. With
> other words: What is the sane default choice?

A newcomer should simply check for __name__ == "__main__". Learning
about packaging comes later.

> Chris wrote "Simple: `scripts` are legacy."
>
> You say it is the standard, and console_scripts is from a third party.

console_scripts and gui_scripts are installed by setuptools and pip,
which are developed under the umbrella of the Python Packaging
Authority [1]. The standard library also has the ensurepip [2] module
to install pip and setuptools. As third-party packages go, they're as
close to being 'standard' as you can get.

> For me "legacy" sound like "don't go this old way".

Legacy scripts aren't automatically created as console or GUI
executables when installed on Windows. Often Windows users associate
.py scripts with an editor, in which case legacy scripts aren't
executable from PATH, i.e. they have to be run as `python
legacy_script.py`, for example.

[1]: https://www.pypa.io
[2]: https://docs.python.org/3/library/ensurepip