Writing a win32 installer in Python?

[Jan Ploski]

Hello,

I have recently tried out JPython and that's how I learned to know about
Python as such.

This is certainly a very newbie-ish question, but is it possible to write
code in Python and then compile it into a win32 executable?

Specifically, I would like to know whether it makes sense to try to write
a custom installer in Python for a Java application (some file copying,
extraction, and manipulation of the Windows registry is needed). I would not
like to buy nor learn Visual C++ for that purpose. Buying a shrink-wrapped
installer like InstallAnywhere is an alternative, but I am curious if Python
could come to rescue. If that's completely unrealistic (i.e. a 5 MB Python
interpreter needed to get started), let me know. I have no idea.

Thanks!

-JPL