python3.2m installed as (additional) binary

[Tom Zych]

andrew cooke wrote:
> I just downloaded, built and altinstalled Python3.2 on Linux x64.  I noticed that in /usr/local/bin I have two identical (says diff) binaries called Python3.2 and Python3.2m.  Is this expected?  I can find very little reference to them apart from a short discussion in python-dev where someone asks if users will be confused by this and Barry Warsaw replies saying that they won't see them (well, I do!).
> 
> All I did was the usual ./configure; make; sudo make altinstall
> 
> So is this a bug?
> 
> pl6 Python-3.2: ls -l /usr/local/bin/python3.2*
> -rwxr-xr-x 2 root root 7368810 2011-02-27 13:03 /usr/local/bin/python3.2
> -rwxr-xr-x 2 root root 7368810 2011-02-27 13:03 /usr/local/bin/python3.2m
> -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root    1826 2011-02-27 13:03 /usr/local/bin/python3.2m-config
> pl6 Python-3.2: diff  /usr/local/bin/python3.2 /usr/local/bin/python3.2m
> pl6 Python-3.2:

It looks like they're hard links of each other. Try:
  ls -li /usr/local/bin/python3.2*

Are the inode numbers the same?

I suspect the "m" name is what gets built and the "no m" is an alias for
backwards-compatibility. Not sure why they did the "m", though.

-- 
Tom Zych / freethinker at pobox.com
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur.