It is with some trepidation that I post:
This is a summary of traffic on the python-dev mailing list between
Feb 1 and Feb 14 2001. It is intended to inform the wider Python
community of ongoing developments. To comment, just post to
python-list@python.org or comp.lang.python in the usual way. Give
your posting a meaningful subject line, and if it's about a PEP,
include the PEP number (e.g. Subject: PEP 201 - Lockstep iteration)
All python-dev members are interested in seeing ideas discussed by
the community, so don't hesitate to take a stance on a PEP if you
have an opinion.
This is the first python-dev summary written by Michael Hudson.
New summaries will probably appear at:
http://www.python.org/dev/summary/
When I get round to it.
Posting distribution (with apologies to mbm)
Number of articles in summary: 498
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A fairly busy fortnight on python-dev, falling just short of five
hundred articles. Much of this is making ready for the Python 2.1
release, but people's horizons are beginning to rise above the
present.
* Python 2.1a2 *
Python 2.1a2 was released on Feb. 2. One of the more controversial
changes was the disallowing of "from module import *" at anything
other than module level; this restriction was weakened after some
slightly heated discussion on comp.lang.python.
<http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2001-February/012815.html>
It is possible that non-module-level "from module import *" will
produce some kind of warning in Python 2.1 but this code has not yet
been written.
* Performance *
Almost two weeks ago, we were talking about performance. Michael
Hudson posted the results of an extended benchmarking session using
Marc-Andre Lemburg's pybench suite:
<http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2001-January/012330.html>
to which the conclusion was that python 2.1 will be marginally
slower than python 2.0, but it's not worth shouting about. The use
of Vladimir Marangoz's obmalloc patch in some of the benchmarks
sparked a discussion about whether this patch should be incorporated
into Python 2.1. There was support from many for adding it on an
opt-in basis, since when nothing has happened...
* Imports on case-insensitive file systems *
There was quite some discussion about how to handle imports on a
case-insensitive file system (eg. on Windows). I didn't follow the
details, but Tim Peters is on the case (sorry), so I'm confident it
will get sorted out.
* Sets & iterators *
The Sets discussion rumbled on, moving into areas of syntax. The
syntax:
for key:value in dict:
was proposed. Discussion went round and round for a while and moved
on to more general iteration constructs, prompting Ka-Ping Yee to
write a PEP entitled "iterators":
<http://python.sourceforge.net/peps/pep-0234.html>
Please comment!
Greg Wilson announced that BOFs for both sets and iterators have
been arranged at the python9 conference in March:
<http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2001-February/012824.html>
* Stackless Python in Korea *
Christian Tismer gave a presentation on stackless python to over 700
Korean pythonistas:
<http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2001-February/012601.html>
I think almost everyone was amazed and delighted to find that Python
has such a fan base. Next stop, the world!
* string methodizing the standard library *
Eric Raymond clearly got bored one evening and marched through the
standard library, converting almost all uses of the string module to
use to equivalent string method.
* Python's release schedule *
Skip Montanaro raised some concerns about Python's accelerated
release schedule, and it was pointed out that the default Python for
both debian unstable and Redhat 7.1 beta was still 1.5.2. Have
*you* upgraded to Python 2.0? If not, why not?
* Unit testing (again) *
The question of replacing Python's hoary old regrtest-driven test
suite with something more modern came up again. Andrew Kuchling
enquired whether the issue was to be decided by voting or BDFL fiat:
<http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2001-February/012830.html>
Guido obliged:
<http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2001-February/012831.html>
There was then some discussion of what changes people would like to
see made in the standard-Python-unit-testing-framework-elect
(PyUnit) before they would be happy with it.
Cheers,
M.
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