Modules for inclusion in standard library?

[Tom Anderson]

On Fri, 1 Jul 2005, Scott David Daniels wrote:

> Daniel Dittmar wrote:
>> Rocco Moretti wrote:
>>
>>>>> Except that (please correct me if I'm wrong) there is somewhat of a 
>>>>> policy for not including interface code for third party programs 
>>>>> which are not part of the operating system. (I.e. the modules in the 
>>>>> standard libary should all be usable for anyone with a default OS + 
>>>>> Python install.)
>> 
>> There seems to be a great reluctance by the Python developers to add 
>> modules of the expat kind, as this means responsibilities for 
>> additional source modules. There's also the problem with incompatible 
>> licenses, integrating a second configure, deciding when to update to 
>> the latest version of the library etc.
>
> If you haven't noticed, the Python code has a substantial body of unit
> tests.  Arranging the tests to be easily runnable for all developers
> is going to be tough for "third party programs."

The tests for interface modules would have to use mock objects on the back 
end. This is pretty standard practice, isn't it?

> Making the interfaces work for differing versions of the 3PPs as the 
> third parties themselves change their interfaces (see fun with Tcl/Tk 
> versions for example), and building testbeds to test to all of those 
> differing versions, would cause a nightmare that would make a knight of 
> Ni scream.

But given that at a number of such modules have in fact been written, 
along with tests, why not add them to the standard distribution?

tom

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