ActivePython 2.0 Release

[Jason Cunliffe]

Hello

I appreciated your clarification of many issues about ActivePython2.0. I
hope you go much further in this direction

Python is going through a lot of growing pains now and there seems to be
quite a bit of paranoia and suspicions around ActiveState. I cannot speak to
ActiveState's 'reputation' as I never heard of it until recently...And I do
not pretend to fathom the licensing issues at stake. But I wish to god each
of the Python distributions could find a way to simplify the main licensing
issues and present them in  comparative manner. This would help everyone
make an informed choice

As I understand it there is a real advantage to having a solid distribution
provided it does not end up in Python spinning off into too many flavors of
incompatibleness. What I recommend to both ActiveState and PythonLabs to do
is to put much clearer information on the websites preferable in table
format so one can see what is being offered, what is included etc. Python
has a significant community of very experienced users, many of whom may now
be uncomfortable with a new era adn Python's growing 'success'. On the other
hand because of this success, Python is attracting many new programmers,
including people searching for a starter language. These latter know nothing
of the politics and recent upheavals. What they do face immediately is quite
a bit of confusing presentations. ActiveState can rally help here by
improving the information and reasons why ActivePython exists and where you
are going etc. In other words formalize and illustrate your post to
comp.lang.python in an open comparative manner and people will accept you
more readily.

For my own part I see 3 good reasons to consider ActivePython:

1. Some very talented well respected Python gurus have fulltime paid jobs to
make this work. Mark Hammond and Andy Robinson's book 'Python programming on
Win32' is one of the few really good Python books out there.

2. ActivePython is listed regularly in magazines and elsewhere as being on
board for M$ .NET evolution. Much as everyone in the Linux oss world loves
to bash M$, I believe .NET is a very important change of direction ... an
intelligent and appropriate one by M$ which will benefit everyone. IT is
important in terms of perception and practicality. But it will take 2 years
to see if it works adn for all the necessary parts to be in place.. That is
a long time in Internet time..

Having Python introduced at the start in this new scheme is very good news
for its long term adoption as a default language. This is perhaps the best
chance Python will get to show itself off against VisualBasic etc. It is
also among its best chances to be accepted in Schools as serious
introductory programming language. It means as Python continues to gather
momentum in the opensource Linux world, that it will not get left behind in
the win32 .Net world. This is important because it maintains its
portability... one of its major features.. BUT only if ActiveState remain
keenly tuned to this issue.. ELSE we descend into a familiar chaos. I
suspect this is what is behind so much suspicion of ActivePython.

3. Easy download is a real advantage for newbies. In practice ease of
download can largely be addressed by having really excellent website design.
PythonLabs looks pretty messy to me at the moment. There are lists and links
aplenty, but it lacks a good map, and the design imho is cute but very
amateur [green type gets tiring fast]. I know PythonLabs team have been very
busy adn making hard changes getting the basics sorted out [new versions
wow]. But the PythonLabs site MUST address the needs of all python users or
suffer the consequences. If PythonLabs considers itself the spiritual
epicenter of Python then it needs to present as such  ...

: Give a clear view also of who why what is www.python.org is,
: Give a clear view also of who why what is
http://www.activestate.com/Products/ActivePython/

If one searches for 'python' on Google for example , it is invariable the
classic python sites which come up. This is the confusing reality and
PythonLabs ActiveState and others cannot ignore this.

A real advantage which ActivePython can , and should offer imho is ready
compiled Win32 binaries of valuable libraries which python can use.

For example: I am using the Berkeley DB python wrapper developed by Robin
Dunn. Now that he is rightly focusing on the wonderful wxPython, I ma happy
to see the bsddb torch has been passed to  Gregory P. Smith
http://electricrain.com/greg/python/bsddb3/
The new version uses Berkeley 3.1 available at
http://www.sleepycat.com/download.html
I would like very much to upgrade but do not own a copy of Microsoft C++
compiler on Win32 needed to build Berkeley Storage

What to do?

A decent ActivePython distribution should offer MORE not less and especially
make it easier and better to work with these out of the box.

Other modules I would love to see bundled include:, NumericPy, mxDateTime,
mxODBC, SEQDICT.. all the tools which really show off Python's strengths.
Beyond this are the fabulous cross platform Gui tools like wxPython, and
BOA. Perhaps these go against the grain of ActivePython, but perhaps not ==
it might be an excellent way to spread the strength and usefulness of the
distribution as a crossplatform solution.

Finally, what ActivePython could really do to help Python community is to
publish affordable Python booklets. I suggest short focused titles under $5
to $15 price range in a disposable magazine format. A focused series of
publications addressing realworld issues. Much if this could be
semi.tutorial topic based.

Python still needs a much better bookstore/newstand presence. There is a
huge publishing niche left unfilled by low cost magazine + CD style
progamming. In Korea this is brilliantly filled by color ilustrated
stepbystep series published by SamGakHyungPress
www.samgak.com.
A list is at
http://www.ok-easy.com/ok_easy/re_book_list.asp?category1=6

These are under 100 pages, color highly illustrated wiht many screen shots.
This is partly becuase the focus is graphics and mutlimedia software, but
also becuase of teh language differntial between Korean and English. There
is another reason why  ...many software instructions are very verbose when
truyign to descirble thinsg liek menues adn toolboxes adn sequences of
actions. But very concise and simple when a series of small screen shots or
highlighted annotated zooms are repsented.They sell for 3,800 WON = $3.50

In France also there is a  tradition of all kinds of samll chaep howto
booklets. The US market is sauturated by dumb overheavy overpriced tomes.
Some are excellent but many are garbage as we know. The leadtime to market
for a good book is a long and painful road. Magazine articles and webzines
have been filling this beter and better. In Python's case consider all the
great online work by Jon Udell, Cameron Laird, Stephen Figgins and others.
What is a shame is that these cannot be made available or edited into a more
general printed public format. This could increase the awareness of Python
at large and open up a new publishing format lackign in the USA. If well
done it could easily be extended in translation to cover a much wider
international market.

If anyone is interested to pursue this idea of PythonPress then please
contact me.

 Jason
________________________________________________________________
Jason CUNLIFFE = NOMADICS['Interactive Art and Technology'].DesignDirector

----- Original Message -----
From: Paul Prescod <paulp at ActiveState.com>
Newsgroups: comp.lang.python
To: <python-list at python.org>
Sent: Friday, October 20, 2000 6:07 PM
Subject: Re: ActivePython 2.0 Release


> Before I start to describe the benefits of the ActivePython 2.0
> installation for windows, I'd like to make the point that as far as I
> know, ActiveState is the first source for Python 2.0 binaries for
> Solaris,
> and Debian Linux (in addition to the more mainstream Windows and RPM
> installations). Quality assured cross-platform distributions are a big
> part of our mission. So looking only at the Windows installer does not
> give the whole picture.
>
> Q. How does ActivePython benefit the Windows user?
>
> We strove to make ActivePython the easiest way to
> get started with Python 2.0. It is certainly possible to download most
> parts of the ActivePython product from various sites:
>
>  * Python 2.0 core
>  * PythonWin environment
>  * Win32 APIs
>  * TKinter
>  * Indexed HTMLHelp versions of Python documentation
>
> If you are a Python expert and you know what you want and where to get
> it, then ActivePython may not be of interest to you. On the other hand,
> when you wish to distribute a program with dependencies on these various
> packages you may want to point your customers at ActiveState's
> distribution rather than at various download sites.
>
> In addition to the major advantages of multi-platform support and ease
> of
> installation, ActivePython is expected to be the first of many
> ActiveState
> Python-world products. We look forward to being able to point our
> customers at a family of quality assured, cross-platform distributions
> rather than multiple parts for multiple operating systems. Also, we are
> not bound by anyone else's release schedule so we can release newer
> versions on an accelerated schedule when we feel that will benefit our
> customers.
>
> Q. Why use the Microsoft Installer (MSI)?
>
> My opinion is that an operating system should come with a standard
> installation engine rather than having it bundled in each executable
> distribution. This allows much safer and cleaner uninstallation and
> dependency tracking because the operating system knows everything that
> is going on. In my personal opinion, Microsoft, Red Hat, Debian etc.
> have finally gotten this right. It is unfortunate that older versions of
> Windows do not come with MSI. Even if we had Guido's time machine I
> don't think we could correct that situation. I've railed against the
> Windows installer situation for about a decade and it didn't have any
> effect the first time!
>
> Q. How does ActivePython differ from PythonLabs in terms of
> "standard-ness"?
>
> We have one minor bug fix and miscellaneous changes to the build system
> and documentation to reflect our alternate documentation delivery
> format.
> The primary reason that there are so few differences is because
> ActiveState contributes our improvements to the Python core to the
> Python
> development team. That ensures that we remain standard and everybody
> benefits from our work.
>
> Q. What's in the package?
>
> ActivePython ships with TKinter and IDLE but not TK. This keeps our file
> size down. IDLE is not in the start menu because it depends on TKinter
> and
> anyway it would be somewhat confusing for us to suggest two development
> environments for the same product.
>
> We are certainly interested in feedback on our choice of extensions to
> include and exclude. This is especially true of the GUI world where
> there are many different libraries competing for support.
>
> ActivePython-Feedback at activestate.com is the best place to voice these
> opinions because it is connected to our bug and feature request tracking
> systems.
>
> Q. Why doesn't the license allow redistribution?
>
> ActiveState's license does not allow redistribution without contacting
> us. Anyone who has created, tested and supported multiple platform
> installations knows that this is a large effort and ActiveState depends
> upon the publicity that accrues from having people download from our
> site. This also helps us to quickly take obsolete versions (especially
> betas) out of circulation and to ensure that our customers have the code
> we expect them to have.
>
> Q. What does ActivePython contribute to the Python world?
>
> Guido has stated on various occasions that he hoped that multiple Python
> distributions would arise and thrive. Out of the box, ActivePython is an
> excellent platform for developing Windows, Linux or Solaris
> applications. Those who are new to Python world and want to get up and
> running, with lets say COM or MFC programming quickly and easily now
> have a choice that gets them there. Choice is good.
>
> Also, not every ActiveState product will be groundbreaking and
> revolutionary. Some are incremental improvements. Nevertheless, we have
> announced many products that will take Python places it has never been
> before and ActivePython is a part of that strategy.
>
>  Paul Prescod
>  ActiveState Tool Corp.
>