Re: Proposed Modules, My Take

[Sean Middleditch <elanthis awesomeplay com>]

On Wed, 2005-01-19 at 16:29 +0100, Murray Cumming wrote:
> I agree that it's a good idea to choose a single python version for each
> GNOME release. If everyone agrees, then we can add that to our "rules".
> 
> However, if we don't, it's up to the distro to install stuff that GNOME
> needs. How is this different to saying "what happens if a distro has
> GNOME 2.10 but doesn't have GTK+ 2.6"?

That distro has broken GNOME.  There's a difference between a distro
that breaks GNOME and a distro that is following our rules but still
results in broken apps.  In the first case it is the distro's fault; in
the second case it's GNOME's fault for not guiding the distro.

Contrived analogy: A coworker is dehydrated and needs water, so I ask
you to go get something to drink.  You come back with a can of soda.  If
I didn't ask for water, then it's my fault for not saying what I wanted.
If I did say water and you still came back with soda, then it's your
fault for not following directions.

> 
> [snip]
> > We at least need to make it possible
> > for a distro to do the right thing.
> 
> The last time we discussed this, there was clear consensus that each
> Desktop module that uses python should use the #! to specify the python
> version that it uses. That makes it easy for distros to know what python
> version is needed. If we don't choose one version for each GNOME release
> then that might mean that we need multiple versions, but that's not so
> strange for distros.
> 
> And the pygtk folks even produced a standalone example so that we had a
> good example of this kind of thing.

That's fine, so long as we do actually clearly document and specify the
version.  All I'm asking.  ^_^

> 
> > > > Both problems disappear if we mandate that, say, Python 2.3 be used and
> > > > that all apps using the "official GNOME Bindings" reference python-2.3
> > > > explicitly, or something like that.
> > > 
> > > That would be nice. It might be a problem if we all have to wait for the
> > > module that is last to port to a new version.
> > 
> > That shouldn't ever be a problem because the version should be fixed.
> > We don't break ABI in any other library exposed by GNOME and we don't
> > depend on any libraries with changing ABIs that are exposed to users of
> > the GNOME API - bindings should be no different.
> 
> That's a good point, though I think it's about the Bindings, and nothing
> to do with whether we use them in the Desktop.
> 
> However, the current Bindings rules would allow pygtk to require a new
> version of Python, as long as the old version of pygtk could be
> parallel-installed and continue to work with the old version of python.
> I think a verion of pygtk can already be installed for each version of
> python on a distro, so I don't think that's a problem.

Right.

>   
> The rules for the Platform are more strict. If pygtk was in the Platform
> then no new version of pygtk could require a newer version of Python
> until GNOME 3.0.
> 
> Getting back to the Desktop, there are no rules that say that the
> libraries or platform used by Desktop modules must be ABI stable.

In the Desktop, no.  I thought it was mentioned in another part of the
thread that PyGTK was being recommended for Bindings?  If it's just in
the Desktop then none of my arguments matter much and I'm sorry for
wasting your time on it...

>