[Python-Dev] Killing off bdist_dumb (original) (raw)

Guido van Rossum guido@python.org
Wed, 13 Nov 2002 17:24:14 -0500

> Aren't zipfiles used as el-cheapo installers on Windows? I've seen > plenty of stuff that was distributed as a simple zipfile, with > instructions "unpack ".

Sure, but on Windows, you have bdistwininst, which isn't any more difficult to use, and far superior. People building distutils packages for Windows appreciate the fancy-without-efforts installer (I'm one of those people myself); I would never consider using bdistdumb on Windows. In fact, I thought it was meant for systems like Solaris, where the native packaging is not supported. Of course, on Solaris, I would expect to get a .tar.gz, not a .zip. So even though I do use binutils binary packages, I would not suffer from losing bdistdumb, and I can't imagine anybody who would.

OK, but bdist_wininst feels fragile (especially when I see checkins of a pile of binary gunk each time something has changed). Zip files are a lowest common denominator.

Why do you want to lose bdist_dumb?

--Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/)