[Python-Dev] Docs of weak stdlib modules should encourage exploration of 3rd-party alternatives (original) (raw)

Paul Moore p.f.moore at gmail.com
Tue Mar 13 15:52:19 CET 2012

On 13 March 2012 13:34, Donald Stufft <donald.stufft at gmail.com> wrote:

http://python-guide.org ?

Hmm, yes maybe. I had seen this before (it's where I found out about requests, IIRC).

As it says, it "is mostly a skeleton at the moment". With some fleshing out, then it's probably a good start. I have some problems with its recommendations (notably "If you’re starting work on a new Python module, I recommend you write it for Python 2.5 or 2.6, and add support for Python3 in a later iteration." which is probably not appropriate for something that would be officially sanctioned by the core developers). Also, I don't think we want something advertised as "opinionated".

And it covers a much wider area than the original suggestion. I'd envisaged something more like a simple list of "obvious" modules:

""" Requests - URL

Requests is a module designed to make getting resources from the web as easy as possible. It is a simpler and more powerful alternative to the stdlib urllib and urllib2 modules. ...

Some code samples here giving basic usage. """

My ideal would be something I could scan in a few spare moments, and pick up pointers to particular modules that I'd find useful. Basically, take the "Scenario Guide" section of python-guide, flesh it out, and turn it into a flat list. (I don't like the "Scenario" approach as it tends to force people into a particular view of the world, but maybe that's just me, my applications tend to be more eclectic than any of the "normal" categories).

Paul.

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