[Python-Dev] [Python-3000] Reminder: last alphas next Wednesday 07-May-2008 (original) (raw)
Nick Coghlan ncoghlan at gmail.com
Sat May 3 11:05:43 CEST 2008
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skip at pobox.com wrote:
Fred> If user-local package installs went to ~/ by default ... with a Fred> way to set an alternate "prefix" instead of ~/ using a distutils Fred> configuration setting, I'd be happy enough.
+1 from me.
But then we clutter up people's (read my) home directory with no way for them to do anything about it. We should stay out of people's way by default, while making it easy for them to poke around if they want to. The ~/.local convention does that, but using ~/ directly does not.
The major reasons why I think staying out of people's way by default is important:
- for people like me (glyph, Georg, etc), it allows us to keep our home directory organised the way we like it. As far as I am concered, applications can store whatever user-specific configuration and data files they like inside hidden files or directories, but they shouldn't be inflicting any visible files on me that aren't related to things I am working on.
- for novice users, the fact that it's hidden helps keep them from deleting it by accident
- for experienced users (Barry, skip, etc) that want ~/.local to be more easily accessible, creating a visible ~/local symlink is an utterly trivial exercise.
Switching the default to use public directories instead of hidden ones helps the third group at the expense of the first two groups. Given that the third group already has an easy workaround to get the behaviour they want, that seems like a bad trade-off to me.
Cheers, Nick.
-- Nick Coghlan | ncoghlan at gmail.com | Brisbane, Australia
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