Path: csiph.com!aioe.org!bofh.it!news.nic.it!robomod From: Stefano Rivera Newsgroups: linux.debian.maint.python Subject: Challenges packaging Python for a Linux distro - at Python Language Summit Date: Wed, 12 May 2021 23:30:01 +0200 Message-ID: X-Mailbox-Line: From debian-python-request@lists.debian.org Wed May 12 21:21:35 2021 Old-Return-Path: X-Amavis-Spam-Status: No, score=-6.751 tagged_above=-10000 required=5.3 tests=[BAYES_00=-2, DKIMWL_WL_HIGH=-0.001, DKIM_SIGNED=0.1, DKIM_VALID=-0.1, DKIM_VALID_AU=-0.1, FOURLA=0.1, HEADER_FROM_DIFFERENT_DOMAINS=0.25, LDO_WHITELIST=-5] autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no X-Policyd-Weight: using cached result; rate: -4.6 Mail-Followup-To: debian-python MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 Content-Disposition: inline X-Gpg-Public-Key: http://www.rivera.za.net/stefano.gpg User-Agent: NeoMutt/20180716 X-Mailing-List: archive/latest/19144 List-ID: List-URL: List-Archive: https://lists.debian.org/msgid-search/20210512212118.r37fau7lw5lbh72e@satie.tumbleweed.org.za Approved: robomod@news.nic.it Lines: 52 Organization: linux.* mail to news gateway Sender: robomod@news.nic.it X-Original-Date: Wed, 12 May 2021 21:21:18 +0000 X-Original-Message-ID: <20210512212118.r37fau7lw5lbh72e@satie.tumbleweed.org.za> Xref: csiph.com linux.debian.maint.python:13357 Matthias Klose gave a presentation at the Python Language Summit on the Challenges packaging Python for a Linux distro. There's a follow-on open space for working through some of these questions, on Saturday: https://us.pycon.org/2021/events/open-spaces/#openspace-42 2021-05-15 18:15 UTC in Lounge 2 Matthias covered: * No python on Debian systems by default. * Python2 removal coming soon, just hanging around for PyPy at this point. * One 3.x version at a time. Doesn't line up with cpython's support terms. * Python is split into multiple binary packages, for dependency (and historically licensing) reasons. * DFSG * autopkgtests, and automatic testing of reverse-dependencies * The existence of the "deadsnakes" PPA for Ubuntu, for people who want non-standard Python versions. * Applications generally are installed outside the default sys.path. * Modules are shipped installed with --single-version-externally-managed. * The site-packages => dist-packages rename. * PEP 3149 sharing a single /usr/share/python3/ across versions and implementations. * Pip isn't used in our packages (except in rare cases). * A historic look through license issues in the cpython sources, in the past. * The ensurepip module depends on wheels that are shipped without source. * pip and distro package managers get in conflict, esp. with sudo pip install. * Arch inclusively. Debian includes some weird architectures, some of which aren't widely used. * Communication issues between the Core Python developers + PyPA and Debian/Ubuntu recently. There was a strong Q&A section. I didn't take notes for this. Off the top of my head: * What do we provide for scientific / data scientist use cases? * Are there technical issues with using python3.x where x != default? * Are we aware of the problems on Debian? * Who decides what is/isn't packaged? * Have we considered a separate "system-python" that lives off PATH, and is used by Debian packaged applications. Then developers can get their own pristine python? * Who is still suggesting sudo pip install? pip upstream would be happy to help hunt down any references like that. SR -- Stefano Rivera http://tumbleweed.org.za/ +1 415 683 3272