[Python-Dev] Support the /usr/bin/python2 symlink upstream

[Allan McRae]

On 03/03/11 00:29, Piotr Ożarowski wrote:
> [Allan McRae, 2011-03-02]
>> But is that not the whole point of adding the /usr/bin/python2 symlink.
>> That way a developer can explicitly use a /usr/bin/python2 or
>> /usr/bin/python3 shebang and have it portable everywhere.  At the moment,
>> Debian seems to be the major hold-up on that actually being a reality
>> being the only major distro I could find that does not provide such a
>> symlink.
>
> Do you realize how many (still perfectly usable) scripts written in
> Python 2.x few years ago (and not modified since then) are out there?
> Do you realize how much work would it require to fix every single one
> of them to point to /usr/bin/python2 instead? Even if we'd start checking
> mdate and change it at build time automatically, there still will be way
> too many false positives... for no clear gain.

Having made the packages using python-2.x code from an entire 
distribution point at /usr/bin/python2, I have a fair idea of how much 
work is involved...

And that is exactly why changes need made now so that time is available 
for transition.  Providing the /usr/bin/python2 symlink now means that 
any future code would be able to point to it rather than some 
unversioned python binary.  That way in ?? years when python-3.x is 
"the" python and python-2.x is obsolete, and it is decided that 
/usr/bin/python will be python-3.x (which I believe is the only logical 
outcome), then everyone will be a lot more prepared.

Allan