[Mageia-dev] python-virtualenv: package default settings question

Marja van Waes marja11 at xs4all.nl
Wed Feb 22 07:33:32 CET 2012


On 21/02/12 16:58, Lev Givon wrote:
> Received from Marja van Waes on Tue, Feb 21, 2012 at 04:42:20AM EST:
>> On 20/02/12 20:15, Lev Givon wrote:
>>> See https://bugs.mageia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=3358#c3
>>> Anyone care to comment?
>>>
>>> 					L.G.
>> To make replying easier, here is the question from the above link:
>>
>>> By default, virtualenv creates virtual environments using setuptools rather
>>> than distribute. This causes virtualenv to complain if  PYTHONDONTWRITEBYTECODE
>>> is set (which is the default in Mageia):
>>> The PYTHONDONTWRITEBYTECODE environment variable is not compatible with
>>> setuptools. Either use --distribute or unset PYTHONDONTWRITEBYTECODE.
>>> Do we effectively want to require users to explicitly set the variable in order
>>> to use virtualenv with its default settings? (If we do, I can add an
>>> installation message to the package to warn users to unset the variable
>>> themselves.)
>>
>> To me current behaviour as described above sounds strange, even
>> irritating, but I'm not a packager and I don't even use the package,
>> so I don't know enough.
>>
>> @ Lev
>> I understand in Mandriva virtualenv the default settings can be used
>> without having to unset a variable, and that that doesn't cause
>> other problems.  Is that correct?
> The Mandriva package uses the same approach as the one in Mageia,
> i.e., PYTHONDONTWRITEBYTECODE is unset within
> /usr/bin/virtualenv so that it will run successfully without requiring
> that the user explicitly unset the variable or run the script with a
> specific flag.
>
> Given that the variable is only set when virtualenv is run to create a
> virtual environment and does not affect the variable's setting in a
> user's session, I'm inclined to leave the package as-is.
>
Sounds indeed like there is no urgent reason for a change. Besides, 
python-virtualenv users who run both Mageia and Mandriva, or switch 
between them, will probably be glad the package behaves the same in both 
distro's :)

It's a pity no python-virtualenv users seem interested in this 
discussion. There is a (small?) chance they missed it because the 
subject line of the first message in the thread didn't mention the 
package name, though.

Regards,
Marja


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