[Python-Dev] Bug in Py_InitModule4 (original) (raw)

Collin Winter collinw at gmail.com
Thu Dec 29 16:46:28 CET 2005

Hello all,

While working with Subversion's python API bindings this morning, I discovered a function in one of their modules illegally named "import" (svn.client.import, for the curious). Because the extension module in question is written in C, the interpreter doesn't flag the otherwise-illegal identifier "import" at compile-time; if you try to call the function at runtime, however, the interpreter raises a SyntaxError, since svn.client.import is an illegal name.

My question is this: is there any interest in preventing situations like this by including checks in Python/modsupport.c:Py_InitModule4 to make sure that the PyMethodDef contains only valid identifiers, or is this a case of "if it hurts when you do that, don't do that"? I can see a case for both sides: on the one hand, it would be nice to prevent people from accidentally creating inaccessible objects. On the other hand, perhaps this is a job that should be given to tools like SWIG, since they're the ones actually generating the bindings (in the case of SVN).

I've already reported this to the SVN people, but if there's any interest in a CPython-side solution, I'm more than willing to work up a patch to modsupport.c.

Thanks, Collin Winter

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