[Python-Dev] Automatic encoding detection [was: Re: Python3 "complexity" - 2 use cases]

[Terry Reedy]

On 1/13/2014 7:06 PM, Chris Angelico wrote:
> On Tue, Jan 14, 2014 at 10:48 AM, Jim J. Jewett <jimjjewett at gmail.com> wrote:
>> Agreed.  But "most programs will need it, and people will either
>> include (the same) 3rd-party library themselves, or write their
>> own workaround, or have buggy code" *is* sufficient.
>
> Well, no, that's not sufficient on its own either. But yes, it's a
> stronger argument.
>
>> But having a batch process crash one run in ten (where it didn't
>> crash at all under Python 2) is a bad thing.  There are environments
>> where (once I knew about it) I would add chardet (if I could get
>> approval for the 3rd-party component).
>
> Having it *do the wrong thing* one run in ten is even worse.
>
> If you need chardet, then get approval for the third-party component.
> That's a political issue, not a technical one. "This needs to be in
> the stdlib because I'm not allowed to install anything else"? I hope
> not. Also, a PyPI package is free to update independently of the
> Python version schedule. The stdlib is bound.

This discussion strikes me as more appropriate for python-ideas. That 
said, I am leery of a heuristics module in the stdlib. When is a change 
a 'bug fix'? and when is it an 'enhancement'?

-- 
Terry Jan Reedy