[Python-Dev] PEP 374 (DVCS) now in reST (original) (raw)

Nick Coghlan ncoghlan at gmail.com
Sun Jan 25 01:44:23 CET 2009

Brett Cannon wrote:

On Sat, Jan 24, 2009 at 15:34, "Martin v. Löwis" <martin at v.loewis.de> wrote:

Second, I think it would be good to explicitly mention the option of deferring this PEP. Based on previous discussion, it sounds like there are a fair number of people who think that there is a DVCS in Python's future, but not now (where "now" means over the next couple of years). Sure, I can add a note somewhere that says if a clear winner doesn't come about the PEP can be revisited to a later date.

I think the request is slightly different: consider that a potential outcome should be "svn for the next five years, then reconsider" - not because none of the DVCS is a clear winner, but because there is too much resistance to DVCSes in general, at the moment. I already put a note in that no DVCS might be chosen once the PEP is finished. Whether it is because no DVCS is a clear improvement over svn or people just don't like a DVCS seems like a minor thing to worry about to spell out in the PEP.

I suspect the reactions will be more nuanced than that anyway - e.g. my current position is that while I like the idea of a DVCS in principle and agree there are definite gains to be had in switching to one, I don't think the contenders have had enough time to shake out their competing feature sets and relative performance. We don't seem to lose a lot by sticking with SVN at least until after 2.7/3.1 are out the door and then revisiting the DVCS question (this is particularly so given that the current plan is go for a fairly short turnaround on those two releases).

As the zen says, now is better than never, but never is often better than right now :)

Cheers, Nick.

-- Nick Coghlan | ncoghlan at gmail.com | Brisbane, Australia

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