2009/10/5 K. Richard Pixley <r...@noir.com>: > I'm recent to python packaging and distribution, so let me see if I've put > this together right from my reading of the various web pages involved over > the weekend. > > Distutils is currently part of the standard python library. As such, it's > released with python, (the reference implementation, anyway). Distutils is > currently capable of producing only source archives of packages. While it's > capable of producing "built" archives, those archives are machine specific, > nonrelocatable, untrackable, and have no standard method for distribution > nor installation nor tracking. > > Setuptools was a third party addition to, (and partial replacement of), > distutils because distutils wasn't suitably usable nor was it moving fast > enough. However, since setuptools was initiated, many of the major features > of setuptools have since been folded back into distutils, making setuptools > partially redundant and partly colliding. Setuptools provides the ability > to produce machine independent "built" archives and a standard method for > installing them, (although not for tracking or removing them). And the > setuptools approach to installation, easy_install, doesn't play nice with > the native installers on systems that have them like rpm, debian, etc. > > However, setuptools has fallen into disrepair and so distribute has been > created, as a friendly branch off a third party tool which in turn was a > form of branch off of distutils. And within distribute, there are two lines > of development, the 0.7 line, which is intended to replace... I'm > confused. Does it replace setuptools or distutils? And then there's the > 0.6 branch, which is a branch off 0.7 which is a branch of setuptools which > is a branch of distutils which is under recent active development and yet it > also expected to be stable, as much as such a term can be applied to a third > party branch off a third party of a colliding replacement with a standard > facility. > > Is that about right? > > If I'm anywhere near right, then I can't really imagine what state you > intend for the 0.6 branch if not development.
I believe that the Distribute 0.6 branch is a stable continuation of the setuptools (0.6) stable branch. Distribute 0.6 is intended to include maintenance-only stable fixes (on the basis that setuptools no longer provides even that minimal level of progress - something on which I won't comment for fear of starting another long thread). Distribute 0.7 is the development branch, looking at new features such as Python 3 support. The only other point you missed is that there is not universal approval of setuptools as a solution to the packaging problem. Take-up of setuptools (and eggs, and easy install, and the various other aspects of the setuptools "ecosystem") is variable, with (as far as I see it) strong support from the web development community, and mixed reception elsewhere in the Python community. Paul. _______________________________________________ Distutils-SIG maillist - Distutils-SIG@python.org http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/distutils-sig
