[Python-Dev] Splitting up _cursesmodule

[Eric S. Raymond]

Fred L. Drake, Jr. <fdrake@acm.org>:
>   I know the question of including these modules in the core
> distribution has come up before, but the resurgence in interest in
> these makes me want to bring it up again:  Does the curses package
> (and the associated C extension(s)) belong in the standard library, or
> does it make sense to spin out a distutils-based package?  I've no
> objection to them being in the core, but it seems that the release
> cycle may want to diverge from Python's.

Curses needs to be in the core for political reasons.  Specifically, 
to support CML2 without requiring any extra packages or downloads
beyond the stock Python interpreter.

And what makes CML2 so constrained and so important?  It's my bid to
replace the Linux kernel's configuration machinery.  It has many
advantages over the existing config system, but the linux developers
are *very* resistant to adding things to the kernel's minimum build
kit.  Python alone may prove too much for them to swallow (though
there are hopeful signs they will); Python plus a separately
downloadable curses module would definitely be too much.

Guido attaches sufficient importance to getting Python into the kernel
build machinery that he approved adding ncurses to the standard modules
on that basis.  This would be a huge design win for us, raising Python's
visibility considerably.

So curses must stay in the core.  I don't have a requirement for
panels; my present curses front end simulates them. But if panels were
integrated into the core I could simplify the front-end code
significantly.  Every line I can remove from my stuff (even if it, in
effect, is just migrating into the Python core) makes it easier to
sell CML2 into the kernel.
-- 
		<a href="http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/">Eric S. Raymond</a>

"Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty
when the government's purposes are beneficient...  The greatest dangers
to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well meaning
but without understanding."
	-- Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis