Porting from Python 2.3 to 2.4

[Rocco Moretti]

Joseph Garvin wrote:
> Anand wrote:
> 
>> Hi
>>
>>   Are there any tools that would help in porting code from
>> Pyton 2.3 to 2.4 ? I have gone through the whatsnew documents
>> and created a document comparing Python 2.4 to 2.3. But so far
>> has not been able to find any tool that will signal code in
>> Python 2.3 that can cause errors in Python 2.4 .
>>
>> rgds
>>
>> -Anand
>>
>>  
>>
> All 2.x versions are backwards compatible. Porting just means taking 
> advantage of new features. Unless you've been naughty and are accessing 
> private methods in stdlib, you're probably fine.

Not strictly speaking true - if your program is taking advantage of some 
of the dark corners of the language, there is a chance your program 
might not work. Be aware though, that programs that take advantage of 
"features" which change between 2.x releases likely aren't using best 
practices anyway. (The Python team strongly hesitates to change behavior 
if it breaks backward compatibility for a large number of programs.)

See http://www.python.org/doc/2.4.1/whatsnew/whatsnew24.html for details 
on what changes.

Possible non-backward compatible changes for 2.3->2.4 transition:

*Int/long operations no longer produces FutureWarnings that can be 
suppressed. (Uses new behavior instead.)
*Integer operations will no longer trigger an OverflowWarning.
*You can't rebind None.
*New modules/builtin functions added - if you've used the same names, 
you may get the wrong module/function in corner cases.

Minor issues all, but if you happen to rely on that behavior, your code 
will now fail, sometimes silently.