What's the status of Python 2.6 support?

[John Arbash Meinel]

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It seems I don't have Vincent's email. But I'll try to address some of
the things he mentioned.

Matt Nordhoff wrote:

...

>> That's not. If the 'python' found in the path is above 2.4, we
>> use it.
>>
>> KNOWN_PYTHONS is used only if sys.version is lower than 2.4, so
>> if your default python is above that you're not concerned.
>>
>>     >>>> Was that an oversight,
>>
>> It was and is worth fixing (thanks for pointing it out), but
>> really it will trigger in pathological cases only (like in
>> museums where every python version is in the path and the default
>> one is lower than 2.4).
> 
> Ehhm. That's what I get for only skimming the code. :-P
> 
> Thanks for the correction.
> 
>>     >>>> or is there some reason not to use 2.6?
>>
>> And even in the pathological cases, we will not use 2.6 if 2.4 or
>> 2.5 is found first...

well, it would be trivial to change the order, so that you have:
KNOWN_PYTHONS = ('python2.6', 'python2.5', 'python2.4')

>>
>>     >>>> 
>>     >>> I'm pretty sure we should just add it to the list of
>>     >>> KNOWN_PYTHONS 
>>
>> Do we really want to keep that code ? AIUI it makes sense only in
>> environments where the default python is 2.3.  I don't think
>> there are still older pythons around without a newer one
>> available and I doubt that environments can still propose
>> python-2.3 as the default python...
>>
>> Can't we just get rid of the REINVOKE dance in favor of a simple
>> version check and leave distros handle the bang line ?
>>

It is certainly possible that most of the people using Bazaar get it
from a distro build. Except I know some friends I just converted over,
who are still using RHEL 4, which ships only with 2.3. So you have to
install either 3rd party packages or build from source to install Bazaar.

(RHEL 4 seems to have been released 2005-2, with the 4.6 update in
2007-11, but 4.8 only has python 2.3.4)

Anyway, just to say that it does exist out there, and it is nice to have
things "Just Work" when we can. Upgrading distros is traditionally a
pain, especially on production servers.


>>     >>> and make sure it starts getting tested properly.
>>
>> That's a more important point than adding 2.6 to KNOWN_PYTHONS
>> IMHO ;-)
>>
>>     >>> That would also include building 2.6 packages on
>>     >>> win32. I'm not sure if we want to default to py2.6 for
>>     >>> the standalone yet,
>>
>> Having been surprised more than once by unexpected failures due
>> to 2.6, I think it make sense to wait for 2.6 availability on pqm
>> before making 2.6 the default (and even then, we may want to have
>> the test suite run regularly on windows first).
>>

Just to mention that PQM only runs tests against python2.4. It may
change, but I believe the PQM machine is still on 'dapper-6.6'. I think
Intrepid still uses 2.5 by default, but I would guess that Jaunty will
use 2.6. So we should get more direct testing.

>>     Vincent
> 
> Thank you for the information. :-) It's good to know this isn't as
> urgent as I thought.
> 
> (And sorry for quoting everything but only writing three lines...)

The quoting was helpful for me, since I didn't see the original message. :)

John
=:->
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