Distutils for python 2.2.1 under win2000: util.py patch

[Nadav Horesh]

Hi!
I had problems installing Gnuplot1.5 package under python2.2.1.  I got 
an error
which was a result of calling distutils.util.convert_path with an empty 
string argument.
To correct the problem I added

    if len(pathname ) == 0:
        return pathname

as the first executable statement in that function. After that the 
Gnuplot installation completed succesfully.

The question:
 Is it a legal path to keep (did I corrected a bug or just generated a 
new one)?

  Nadav.