[Python-Dev] Another update for PEP 394 -- The "python" Command on Unix-Like Systems

[Nathaniel Smith]

On Thu, Feb 14, 2019 at 12:43 AM Antoine Pitrou <solipsis at pitrou.net> wrote:
>
> On Wed, 13 Feb 2019 17:32:44 -0800
> Nathaniel Smith <njs at pobox.com> wrote:
> > On Wed, Feb 13, 2019 at 3:02 PM Steven D'Aprano <steve at pearwood.info> wrote:
> > >
> > > On Wed, Feb 13, 2019 at 05:16:54PM -0500, Terry Reedy wrote:
> > >
> > > > It appears python is already python3 for a large majority of human users
> > > > (as opposed to machines).
> > > >
> > > > https://www.jetbrains.com/research/python-developers-survey-2018/
> > > > Nearly 20000 valid responses, Oct-Nov.
> > >
> > > They may be valid responses, but we don't know if they are
> > > representative of the broader Python community. Its a self-selected
> > > survey of people which always makes the results statistically suspect.
> > >
> > > (By definition, an Internet survey eliminates responses from people who
> > > don't fill out surveys on the Internet.)
> > >
> > > BUt even if representative, this survey only tells us what version
> > > people are using, now how they invoke it. We can't conclude that the
> > > command "python" means Python 3 for these users. We simply don't know
> > > one way or another (and I personally wouldn't want to hazard a guess.)
> >
> > Can we gather data? What if pip started reporting info on how it was
> > run when contacting pypi?
>
> The most important information pip should report is whether it's
> running on a CI platform (should be doable by looking at a few
> environment variables, at least for the most popular platforms).
> Currently nobody knows what the PyPI download stats mean, because they
> could be 99% human or 99% CI.

I agree :-) https://github.com/pypa/pip/issues/5499#issuecomment-406840712

That's kind of orthogonal to this discussion though.

-n

-- 
Nathaniel J. Smith -- https://vorpus.org