[Python-ideas] size of the installation of Python on mobile devices

[Nick Coghlan]

On 2 August 2016 at 19:09, Stephen J. Turnbull
<turnbull.stephen.fw at u.tsukuba.ac.jp> wrote:
> Nick Coghlan writes:
>  > On 1 August 2016 at 15:46, Stephen J. Turnbull
>  > <turnbull.stephen.fw at u.tsukuba.ac.jp> wrote:
>  > > Victor Stinner writes:
>  > >
>  > >  > Xavier is a core developer.  He is free to dedicate his time to
>  > >  > supporting sourceless distribution :-)
>  > >
>  > > So are we all, core or not.  But on Nick's terms (he even envisions
>  > > releases with the "sourceless" build broken), I don't think adding to
>  > > core is fair to Xavier's (and others') efforts in this direction.
>  >
>  > How would it be any different from our efforts to support other
>  > platforms outside the primary set of Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, and
>  > *BSD?
>
> This isn't platform support in the same sense, for one.  This is a
> variant distribution mode.  A better analogy would be the common
> packaging support we provide for RPMs, debs, and all the whatnots
> associated with different Linux and *BSD distros.  AFAIK there is no
> such support, rather we leave it up to the individual distros, which
> mostly ignore our own packaging technologies (except where implied by
> directory structure).

We have plenty of knobs & dials in the configure script primarily for
use by *nix redistributors in their package build scripts (e.g. the
various "--with-system-*" flags, as well as the Debian-specific
MULTIARCH support that Xavier mentioned).

The fact the existence of these *doesn't* readily spring to mind for
folks not actively involved in Linux distro maintenance is a point in
favour of why I think what Xavier is suggesting is reasonable: we have
long experience with configure flags where the only folks that
typically care those flags exist are the folks that need them, and
when someone else inadvertently breaks those flags, the folks that
care make the necessary updates needed to restore the functionality.

Cheers,
Nick.

-- 
Nick Coghlan   |   ncoghlan at gmail.com   |   Brisbane, Australia