[Distutils] Deprecating little used file types/extensions on PyPI?

[Leonardo Rochael Almeida]

On 19 August 2016 at 14:14, Paul Moore <p.f.moore at gmail.com> wrote:

> [...]
>
> So, the plan becomes:
>
> 1. Change Python 3.6 to default to .tar.gz on Windows
> 2. Change setuptoos to default to .tar.gz, to catch users of older versions
> 3. Document how to create a source distribution as "python setup.py
> sdist (add the --formats=gztar flag if you're on Windows and using a
> Python older than 3.6 and not using setuptools)" in the PUG
> 4. Update https://docs.python.org/3/distutils/sourcedist.html for 3.6
> to note the change in default.
>
> For (3) soften the laboured conditional comment as much as you like,
> but I think we need something to help people who don't understand
> what's going on. For (1) and (4), maybe we don't target 3.6 (given
> setuptools, it's not urgent) but I think we should change the core, if
> only to avoid surprises for people who don't include setuptools in
> their setup.py (maybe relying on pip injecting it for things like
> wheel builds), and so that distutils isn't (in effect) deliberately
> wrong going forward.
>
> > While I think it’s OK to allow .zip in the interim, I do think we should
> be
> > trying to move towards only allowing a single format.
>
> Your arguments are compelling, I have no problem with the conclusion -
> we just need a little more thought on the transition.
>

If we're going through all this trouble, isn't it better just to jump to
.zip files like every other distribution format in existence?

Sure, more people will be affected this way than just the folks releasing
on Windows, but given the shortcuts for setting the sdist format per
project or per home directory that Donald mentioned, I think the collective
effort in the migration will be smaller than the continuous effort of
explaining to newcomers that the reason we use a .tar.gz based format for
sdists versus a .zip based format for wheels is some historical accident,
specially if we plan to change sdists back to .zip format in the future...

Regards,

Leo
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