[Python-Dev] Python 2.7 patch levels turning two digit

[Chris Angelico]

On Tue, Jun 24, 2014 at 6:42 AM, "Martin v. Löwis" <martin at v.loewis.de> wrote:
> See my other message. It's actually heavier, since it requires changes
> to distutils, PyPI, pip, buildout etc., all which know how to deal with
> Python minor version numbers, but are unaware of the notion of competing
> ABIs on Windows (except that they know how to deal with 32-bit vs. 64-bit).

Is it possible to hijack the "deal with 32-bit vs 64-bit"ness of
things to handle the different compilers? So, for instance, there
might be a "32-bit-NewCompiler" and a "64-bit-NewCompiler", two new
architectures, just as if someone came out with a 128-bit Windows and
built Python 2.7 for it. Would packaging be able to handle that more
easily than a compiler change within the same architecture?

ChrisA