[Python-Dev] PEP 0404 and VS 2010 (original) (raw)

Nick Coghlan ncoghlan at gmail.com
Fri Nov 22 10:01:03 CET 2013

On 22 Nov 2013 10:58, "Steve Dower" <Steve.Dower at microsoft.com> wrote:

Nick Coghlan wrote: > For 2.7.7, I think some combination of the two following ideas would be worth > pursuing: > - a C runtime independent API flag (set by default on Windows when building with > a compiler other than VS2008). This would largely be a backport of some of the > stable ABI work from Python 3. > - getting Windows closer to the current Mac OS X situation by ensuring that the > C runtime used directly affects the ABI flags and shared library names. PyPI > would apply the Mac OS X guideline where extensions are expected to be > compatible with the python.org binaries. I don't really think either of these are necessary. With some changes to Python's headers and some extra exports, it should be possible to future-proof Python 2.7.7 against any new compilers, at least on Windows. What I have in mind is basically detecting the MSVC version in the headers (there are preprocessor variables for this) and, if it isn't VC9, substituting a different function for those that require FILE*. This function/macro could call get_osfhandle() and pass it to an API (built into python27.dll) that calls open_osfhandle() and forwards it to the usual API. This should let any compiler be used for building extensions or hosting python27.dll without affecting existing code or requiring changes to the packages. > This would be the biggest change pushed through under the "make builds work" > policy for the extended 2.7 lifecycle, but Microsoft's aggressive approach to > deprecating old compilers and C runtimes means I think we don't have much > choice. Ultimately, compilers are probably going to be deprecated more quickly now that we're on a faster release cadence, which makes it more important that Python 2.7 is prepared for an unknown future. > In the near term, if Stackless build to a different DLL name under VS2010 and > make it clear to their users that extension compatibility issues are possible > (or even likely) if they aren't rebuilt from source, then I think that would be > compatible with the above proposal for a way forward. > Then we'd just need some volunteers to write and implement a PEP or two :) I'm happy to work on a PEP and changes for what I described above, if there's enough interest? I can also update distutils to detect and build with any available compiler, though this may be more of a feature than we'd want for 2.7 at this point.

That's part of what a PEP can help us decide, though, so if you're willing to put one together, that would be great :)

Cheers, Nick.

Cheers, Steve > (Note, similar to the Mac OS X situation, I think we should do this without > hosting any new interpreter variants on python.org - VS2010 and VS2013 source > builds would become separate build-from-source ecosystems for extensions, using > sdists on PyPI as the default distribution mechanism) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/attachments/20131122/83a53272/attachment.html>

More information about the Python-Dev mailing list