[Python-Dev] Deprecate codecs.open() and StreamWriter/StreamReader (original) (raw)

Victor Stinner victor.stinner at haypocalc.com
Tue May 24 12:50:28 CEST 2011

Le mardi 24 mai 2011 à 08:16 +0000, Vinay Sajip a écrit :

> I opened an issue for this idea. Brett and Marc-Andree Lemburg don't > want to deprecate codecs.open() & friends because they want to be able > to write code working on Python 2 and on Python 3 without any change. I > don't think it's realistic: nontrivial programs require at least the six > module, and most likely the 2to3 program. The six module can have its > "codecs.open" function if codecs.open is removed from Python 3.4.

What's "non-trivial"? Both pip and virtualenv (widely used programs) were ported to Python 3 using a single codebase for 2.x and 3.x, because it seemed to involve the least ongoing maintenance burden. Though these particular programs don't use codecs.open, I don't see much value in making it harder to write programs which can run under both 2.x and 3.x; that's not going to speed adoption of 3.x.

pip has a pip.backwardcompat module which is vey similar to six. If codecs.open() is deprecated or removed, it will be trivial to add a wrapper for codecs.open() or open() to six and pip.backwardcompat. virtualenv.py starts also with a thin compatibility layer.

But yes, each program using a compatibily layer/module will have to be updated.

Victor

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