On Wed, 8 Dec 2021 at 12:42, Petr Viktorin <encu...@gmail.com> wrote: > > I assume it would be insensitive to ask whether we could just get rid of > > the stable ABI altogether and focus on the limited API? Just tell > > everyone they have to rebuild binary wheels for every Python feature > > release. Presumably the deprecation of the stable ABI itself would > > require a two-release waiting period. But maybe it would be worth it, > > given how subtle it is to do the historical research about even a single > > function. > > A honest question wouldn't be insensitive. Thanks for asking! > > The part where you don't need to rebuild extensions (not just wheels) is > the main reason for both Stable ABI and the Limited API. > Without it, there might be some reduced API to focus on, but it wouldn't > be this feature.
This I think is the critical point here. I don't follow the API/ABI debate closely, but I do know that the number varieties of C extension builds some projects have to make is a serious overhead. Being able to target the stable ABI and say "this will work for all (essentially) versions of CPython" is a huge benefit, as it reduces the number (and hence the burden) significantly. Not having to amend your source for each CPython release feels to me like a subset of this, and loses a major advantage, so my personal view is that the stable ABI is far more beneficial than the limited API (the limited API is what you fall back to if you're unable to use the stable ABI). Paul _______________________________________________ Python-Dev mailing list -- python-dev@python.org To unsubscribe send an email to python-dev-le...@python.org https://mail.python.org/mailman3/lists/python-dev.python.org/ Message archived at https://mail.python.org/archives/list/python-dev@python.org/message/KCAIYXMKY7RZULJNG7BGM5OQ7RF5Z266/ Code of Conduct: http://python.org/psf/codeofconduct/
