Is there some reason that recent Windows 3.6 releases don't included executable nor msi installers?

[Chris Angelico]

On Fri, May 29, 2020 at 11:57 AM Mike Dewhirst <miked at dewhirst.com.au> wrote:
>
> I am an example
>
> I installed all the Pythons on my Windows 10 dev machine (locked into
> Windows by having clients) but I'm also locked into Python 3.6.9 on my
> Ubuntu 18.04 production machines.

Be careful of assuming too much here. The general policy with most
Linux distributions is to number the version according to the oldest
component in it, but they are free to backport whatever changes they
choose. I have Python 3.4.4 and 3.5.3 on this system (Debian Stretch),
but the 3.5 is numbered "3.5.3-1+deb9u1" which implies some collection
of additional patches. (I'd have to dig deep in the changelogs if I
cared exactly *which* patches.)

> After chasing down an obscure problem I decided to go back to Py36 on
> Windows to be using the same versions in dev as in prd. I couldn't find
> an installer on python.org so I retrieved one (3.6.5) from my archives.

That'd be the same feature version, but depending exactly what the
problem is, there might not be *any* Windows build that exactly
corresponds.

> If I was asked to suggest a guide for which versions ought to get a
> Windows binary I would look at the most popular LTS *nix distros and
> keep Windows binaries in step just to support people like me who cannot
> live with too much Windows clutter. Think of it as deeply humanitarian
> generosity.

Even if that were possible, who are you asking to do this? Whose time
is going to be put into finessing every point release to make sure
it's still buildable on Windows? "LTS" doesn't mean anything since
basically EVERY version of Python is in an LTS of Red Hat (they're
probably still shipping Python 2.3 somewhere).

> Honestly, if you let it, Windows just absolutely knows what you really
> meant despite what you tell it. It is a necessary evil when your clients
> use it.

If your clients use it, are you going to pay someone to build your
installers? And if you aren't going to pay, who is?

Find someone who'd be willing to maintain Windows binaries for you,
and see what they'd charge you for that. Then judge that against the
cost of dropping support for Python 3.6 and requiring your users to
upgrade to a fully-supported version.

ChrisA