[issue34897] distutils test errors when CXX is not set

[Michael Felt]

Michael Felt <aixtools at felt.demon.nl> added the comment:

> On 10/26/2018 5:36 PM, Tal Einat wrote:
> Tal Einat <taleinat at gmail.com> added the comment:
> 
> I'm not sure that the resolution currently suggested, changing compiler.set_executables(), is the right way to go.
> 
> This change to distutils is a break of backwards compatibility. Though it is a minor change, it could still break existing code.
> 
> Fixing test.support seems just as good to me in terms of code design, and better in that it is only used internally for our tests.
> 
> (BTW, instead of `elif cmd is None or (not cmd):`, you can just use `elif not cmd:`.)
Thx. One of the python bits I need to embrace.

Although - during my testing I saw that the null string "" was not being
accepted as None, but was accepted as "not cmd".

My reading error was taking None to mean a value was not initialized
while it seems to be None is a 'value' that is assigned, while ´not xxx'
can be either - never assigned or a null-length string.

This is the "ambiguity", at least for myself, that I feel I tracked down.

It is "unfortunate" if this breaks backward compatibility - IF the
backward compatibility has been based on an ambiguity. Or I again, miss
a fine-point of Python coding. Won´'t be the last time I expect.

Comments requested.

> 
> ----------
> nosy: +taleinat
> 
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> <https://bugs.python.org/issue34897>
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