setup.py - just what is it for ?

[Fredrik Lundh]

Richard Shea wrote:

> Hi - This is probably quite a stupid question but I've never
> understood what setup.py does. I've got a situation at the moment
> where I would like to use a script (which someone else has written and
> made available) to do CGI on a shared webserver to which I do not have
> shell access.
>
> The install instructions say "run python setup.py" but as far as I'm
> aware I cannot do that.

    http://www.python.org/doc/current/inst/

> There is only one script involved (except for the setup.py !) and so
< I'm probably just going to copy it into my cgi-bin and give it a go
> but I'd like to know for future reference just how bad could it be if
> I did this ? Are there circumstances where you must use setup.py to
> have any hope of the code working ?

depends on the package, of course.  e.g. a package that includes C extensions
won't work if you don't compile the C extensions...

</F>