[Python-Dev] What version is an extension module binary compatible with (original) (raw)

Paul Moore p.f.moore at gmail.com
Tue Mar 28 12🔞41 EDT 2017

On 28 March 2017 at 12:24, Miro Hrončok <mhroncok at redhat.com> wrote:

I'd like some clarification on what ABI compatibility we can expect. * Should the ABI be stable across patch releases (so calling PySliceAdjustIndices from an existing macro would be a bug)? * Should the ABI be forward-compatible within a minor release (so modules built for 3.6.0 should be usable with 3.6.1, but not vice versa)? * Or should we expect the ABI to change even across patch releases?

Given that binary wheels are built against a specific minor version (3.6, 3.5, ...) I would expect the ABI to be consistent over a minor release. That would fit with my expectations of the compatibility guarantees on patch releases.

So I from what you describe, I'd consider this as a bug. Certainly, if someone built a C extension as a wheel using Python 3.6.1, it would be tagged as compatible with cp36, and pip would happily use it when installing to a Python 3.6.0 system, where it would fail.

Paul

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