[Python-Dev] Distutils thoughts

[Thomas Heller]

Greg Ewing wrote:
> Paul Moore wrote:
> 
>> I do things like
>>
>>     python setup.py build --compiler=mingw32 bdist_wininst
>>
>> which seem to work for me. Is that any help?
> 
> Possibly. I'll have to try it next time I have the
> problem and see.
> 
> BTW, does that do anything different from
> 
>     python setup.py build --compiler=mingw32
>     python setup.py bdist_wininst
> 
> ? If so, that's rather unintuitive and could do
> with documenting more clearly.

In principle, it does the same.

In practice, it doesn't because 'bdist_wininst' will instantiate
a compiler (by default MSVC) to check whether the extensions need to be
build (built?) or are up to date.  Which will fail unless MSVC is installed.

The best solution is to configure the mingw32 compiler in the distutils
configuration file.

Thomas