[Python-Dev] Inline caveat

[Thomas Heller]

[Guido, about Inline]
> If the alternative is writing an extension module, the inline approach
> sounds viable to me.
> 
> I could also imagine auto-wrapping existing C functions based on
> parseable function signatures.  I believe VB supports this.
> Dangerous, but powerful, and very useful in the right hands.

Isn't this the calldll approach?

> It seems to me that the important idea here is to break away from
> building and distributing a separate extension module, which gets you
> in the edit-compile-link-test-run loop that Python tries to avoid.
> Rather than requiring an expert who knows how to download, build,
> install and use SWIG or how to write Python extensions, all the
> expertise is automated.
> 
> Getting this to work on Windows for the average Windows user would be
> a big hassle, limiting the portability and therefore the usefulness.

My prototype writes a xxx.c file, and uses distutils to build an
extension module of it. The only requirement is a working VC++ compiler.

Thomas