Python vs. Fedora and CentOS

[Michael Torrie]

On 05/31/2010 05:13 AM, Jason D wrote:
> There is however never been an issue to locate different version of python 
> in your system as you deem fit without problems. 
> So I dont understand why your concern.

Actually, replacing python on RHEL is a major endeavor.  Almost all Red
Hat utilities are written in python and depend on the specific system
version of python that they shipped.  Thus if you want to upgrade python
you're going to break 80% of the system.

Sure you can install Python from source alongside the system python, but
that's a maintenance nightmare for system administrators.  I administer
some 30 RHEL instances, and compiling from source just isn't a good
option here.  As for third-party RPMs, that's all fine and well as long
as you don't need any support from Red Hat.  RH can only support
software they ship and certify.  As for me, I don't need RH to support
my custom RPMs, so I think that's probably a fair compromise.  It would
be nice to have a source (that's kept up to date security-wise) of
python packages that can be installed alongside RH system ones.  Maybe
call it python26 or python28 or python31 and stick it in the EPEL
repository.  I am supposing that if anyone wanted to do this, the EPEL
folks would be happy to let that person be the package maintainer.