Mailing List Archive

In article <GIOP2.37825$A6.19136587@news1.teleport.com>,
Paranoid User <root@localhost> wrote:
>
>We have selected Python as the scripting language for the next generation of
>one of our embedded systems. This is a very fast-track project scheduled to
>ship near the end of the first quarter of 2000.
>
>I ran across a quote that said something to the effect that Python 2 will be
>incompatible with Python 1. Before I make a decision as to whether we
>freeze with Python 1.5.2, or migrate to Python 2 when it is released, I need
>to find out the extent of truthfulness in the "quote".

I'm not in the know about Python 2, but I do know this much: Python 2
will almost certainly not ship before your product. Python 2 has also
not been completely designed yet, so nobody (not even Guido) knows the
extent to which Python 2 will be incompatible.

There's also the likely release of Python 1.6; I don't know whether
that's in parallel with the Python 2 development.

I suggest that you work with 1.5.2 and worry about future releases when
there's more clarity.
--
--- Aahz (@netcom.com)

Hugs and backrubs -- I break Rule 6 <*> http://www.rahul.net/aahz/
Androgynous poly kinky vanilla queer het

If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry
about the answers. -- Thomas Pynchon (from EFF quote collection)

[Paranoid User]
> We have selected Python as the scripting language for the next
> generation of one of our embedded systems.

Good choice! Take the opportunity to expand it to all of your systems.

> This is a very fast-track project scheduled to ship near the end of
> the first quarter of 2000.

In Internet time, that's about a century from now; but in Python time, it's
just the early part of next year <wink>.

> I ran across a quote that said something to the effect that Python 2 will
> be incompatible with Python 1. Before I make a decision as to whether we
> freeze with Python 1.5.2, or migrate to Python 2 when it is released, I
> need to find out the extent of truthfulness in the "quote".
>
> So, if anyone in-the-know about Python 2 could let me know the proposed
> extent of its compatibility with 1.5.2 I would really appreciate it.

If anything concrete is known about Python2, it's inside Guido's inscrutable
head. Don't worry about it. Since it doesn't yet exist (nor even a wisp of
a sketch of an outline of a design document), it's all speculation.

My guess is it will end up being more compatible than most dare to hope --
or to fear <0.7 wink>. By and large, the only suggestions Guido has seemed
especially keen about are considered by many to be legitimate design errors
in Python1 (the rift between types and classes is a clear example of that;
that e.g. 3/2 returns 1 instead of 1.5 is a controversial example).

It doesn't much matter for you, though, since Python 1.6 will still be part
of the 1.x line, and won't come out before the end of this year. If the
much-later-still Python2 does turn out to be wildly incompatible, there are
enough people using the Python1 line that someone other than Guido is likely
to take over its maintenance (even if not active future development) -- and
*certain* to take it over if enough companies care enough to pay for that
service.

speaking-for-the-professional-prostitutes-of-the-world-ly y'rs - tim