[Python-Dev] Rework nntlib? (original) (raw)

Brett Cannon brett at python.org
Tue Sep 14 20:34:26 CEST 2010

I'm +1 for Antoine to go ahead and do what he wants; the module is busted as-is and I trust him to make a good judgement call. But I wanted to specifically reply to Skip about removal.

On Tue, Sep 14, 2010 at 09:43, <skip at pobox.com> wrote:

 Baptiste> Reading this from GMANE ;-) I use GMANE too on occasion, but only via the web, as I suppose most people do.  I haven't actually used an NNTP-based app like xrn or gnus in probably two decades.  Do the GMANE folks publish HTTP v. NNTP statistics for their service? I question if the nntplib module is used enough to warrant inclusion with the rest of the batteries.  Not to mention dedication of scarce people resources.  Even though Antoine has kindly volunteered to make the necessary changes, I seem to recall that the email package transition took awhile to get right (and already had a reasonable test suite I suspect).  There are probably more critical parts of Python he could work on instead (though who's to dispute that Antoine has an NNTP itch?)  Finally, is there an application out in the wild using nntplib which is desirous of better NNTP support than Python currently has?

Because it is Antoine and not some random person offering to clean this up I see no need to remove the module. For other modules that turn out to be severely str/bytes broken at this point and does not have a proven core developer to maintain it, then I would agree that removing the module, creating a Mercurial repository for the module, and then having a wiki page listing forks of the code so people can find it more maintained would make sense. But I don't think this is such a case.

As an aside, I also think that having the module in pure Python makes it also an easier argument to keep around. If this was an extension module I probably would be more for removing it (e.g., avoiding security issues like we have had with audioop, etc.).

We got rid of gopherlib a few years ago (deprecated in 2.5, presumably gone in 2.6).  I suspect the NNTP protocol has a greatly diminished user base as well, GMANE's presence notwithstanding.

gopherlib was dropped thanks to lack of developer interest. In this case we have interest so that comparison is not 1:1.

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