Python Library Cleanups

[Matthew Selsky]

On Tue, Sep 26, 2017 at 07:30:02PM -0400, Eric S. Raymond via devel wrote:
> Gary E. Miller via devel <devel at ntpsec.org>:
> > > 2. Gary files a bug upstream to the Python devs detailing how
> > > get_python_lib() is implicated in FHS nonconformance. Gary, you
> > > willing?
> > 
> > I'm feeling like a broken record.  The current behavior is a feature,
> > not a bug.  You know I love to bash Python, but in this case they
> > got it right.
> > 
> > If the user is installing code from source, then it should not
> > be executable by default.  For the same reason /usr/local/bin is
> > not in the standard PATH, the /usr/local/lib/pythonx.x/ is not
> > in the PYTHONPATH.
> > 
> > If you are gonna file a bug on PYTHONPATH, you gotta file one on 
> > PATH.  Just don't put my name on it.
> > 
> > And I still feel there is a middle ground here that might work, but it
> > is not immediately obvious.
> 
> Are you sure we're still talking about the same problem?
> 
> At this point it looks very much as though:
> 
> 1. Our code was accidentally FHS-correct, but not doing what it should,
>    which is calling get_python_lib().
> 
> 2. Fred's patch changed it to do the right thing, call get_python_lib()...
> 
> 3. ...which unmasked an upstream Python bug breaking FHS conformance.
> 
> Does this match your understanding?

Eric, didn't you file a ticket with waf (https://github.com/waf-project/waf/issues/1897) for this same issue in January 2017?

Also, waf chose not to use a directory in sys.path in commit https://github.com/waf-project/waf/commit/588f809ffa4dd514ea90bdcd0341d9baf508784f

See https://github.com/waf-project/waf/pull/1554 for more background.

We could revert that commit in our local waf copy, or we maybe modify the internals in our wscript file...


Cheers,
-Matt