[reportlab-users] 2.2 - distutils versus setuptools

[Andy Robinson]

2008/9/4 Dinu Gherman <gherman at darwin.in-berlin.de>:

> Andy Robinson:

>

>> Thanks, Ralf.  But we are going to start with a distutils script first, as

>> many people have indicated their active dislike for setuptools.

>

> Have I missed something? I can see only replies in favour

> of setuptools (counting my own as +1-epislon) and we don't

> have the vote of Henning, yet.


Matthias, the Ubuntu/Debian packager, was in favour of
classic distutils (which is a pretty big vote) .   So are we
within ReportLab.   Our own main reasons are that (a) it's the
official Python standard at this time, (b) we already have a working
script only needing a little rearrangement, and (c) we hate the way
setuptools installs and upgrades other packages without prompting you.

That doesn't mean "against setuptools" forever, it just means "the distutils
package should be available somewhere".


>

> Also, I'm not sure if your answer means going for distutils

> in 2.2 and setuptools in 2.3 or so or anything else. Maybe

> you can clearify?


Having both kinds of setup script in our repo, ASAP, would be ideal.

(I don't yet know if that means making two source packages available,
or if we can get away with one package and two explicitly named
setup scripts in it.)

Our target for 2.2 is 11th or 12th September.  The critical features for 2.2
are the package rearrangements, pending bug fixes, and documenting
the various changes since 2.1 in a coherent manner.

The 'nice to have' features are the font and text licensing changes for Ubuntu,
and the setuptools scripts.   If these resulted in a 2.3 or 2.2.1 release
in late Sep or early Oct, so be it; but we're moving quite fast and it's
possible we could deal with those things too with your help.

The thing we don't have time for is personally learning all about setuptools
in the remaining time.

Are there any volunteers willing to "maintain" egg-related matters over
the next few weeks? i.e. contribute a script, do some testing, and field
any followup requests arising from it?

- Andy