[Python-Dev] [PEPs] Rebooting PEP 394 (aka Support the /usr/bin/python2 symlink upstream) (original) (raw)

Ned Deily nad at acm.org
Mon Jul 18 10:03:50 CEST 2011

In article <CANaWP3zBo8cNWNHN=jxx_m3tUBk3k+vn+LYgqB+yimdTrzVxwA at mail.gmail.com>, Kerrick Staley <mail at kerrickstaley.com> wrote:

Here are my thoughts: * For Ned's comments, I agree. Although the issue isn't as large with these programs, there's no reason we can't handle them in the same way. I updated the PEP.

Thanks.

Also, I updated the PEP with the clarification that commands like python3 should be hard links (because they'll be invoked from code and are more efficient; also, hard links are just as flexible as symlinks here), while commands like python should be soft links (because this makes it clear to sysadmins that they can be "switched", and it's needed for flexibility if python3 changes). This really doesn't matter, but can we keep it this way unless there are serious objections?

I think adding the requirement to mandate hard link vs soft link usage is an unnecessary and unwarranted attempt at optimization. For instance, IIRC, the OS X installers don't use any hard links: that may complicate the install, plus hard links on OS X HFS* file systems are a bit of a kludge and not necessarily more efficient than symlinks. It's not a big deal but perhaps the wording should be changed to make a suggestion about hard links vs syminks rather than mandate which should be used.

-- Ned Deily, nad at acm.org

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