When Python *Eggs* better than Python *distutils*?? What's Eggs?

[Phillip J. Eby]

Paul Boddie wrote:
> Could anyone enlighten me/us as to why the Smart Package Manager [1]
> (written in Python, presented at EuroPython this year) isn't being more
> closely investigated as part of a suitable solution?

More closely investigated by whom, as a solution for what?  Surely
there is someone somewhere investigating it as a solution for
something, so your presupposition that it isn't would seem to imply
that you have some more specific person(s) and solution(s) in mind.  :)

If you are speaking with respect to setuptools, I would just point out
that it is intended to be packaging-system neutral.  While the
easy_install package manager will work on most platforms supported by
Python, it's intended only for tasks that cannot be accomplished using
the local package management system.  So, I've definitely "closely
investigated" package management tools "as part of a suitable
solution," and have recently added features to make eggs work better
with package management tools.  This consideration, however, does not
extend to providing any special integration with any *particular*
package management tools, especially since some systems (e.g. Windows)
have little or no such support, and a common usage environment for
Python web applications at least (shared hosting providers) offer no
way to *use* the system package manager at all.

That having been said, a few quick glances at Smart's source code show
me that Smart itself could perhaps benefit from eggs, for example to
handle plugins for channels and distribution types.  Its hook system,
for example, could be handled in a decentralized way.  Also, in theory
at least, it looks like Smart could be extended to recognize eggs and
manage them as well, but I haven't looked deeply into any of these
questions since they're not in scope for my efforts at this time.
However, it would certainly appear that *someone* could investigate
making Smart a bigger part of some "suitable solution" for something.
:)