Distributing Python apps

[Dave Brueck]

On Sat, 4 Jan 2003, David LeBlanc wrote:

> Taking a quick glance at just Python, I don't think your goal of putting
> Python + app + data on a single 1.44mb floppy is realistic.
>
> Python installer on windows is 6+mb.
>
> Installed Python is at least 1+mb just for dll's and libs (not including doc
> and examples etc.), of which some parts may not be needed by your app.
> Additional specialist dll's and scripts needed by your app not included in
> that estimate.
>
> In terms of a download, I'm betting that 2+mb for a runtime only including
> application bytes (binaries and doc) is more likely.

This is certainly true for a general-purpose install of Python, but with
a little work you _can_ get an application-specific install of Python down
to well under 1 MB. One application currently shipped by the company I
work for is a small Win32 client app that, including a GUI (not too
complex - a main dialog box with 2 or 3 others), is an .exe at just under
512 KB. It took some effort to get that small, but to get in the sub-1 MB
range was pretty easy.

-Dave