[gentoo-dev] python-2.3.2-r2 changes

[gentoo-dev] python-2.3.2-r2 changes

[Alastair Tse]

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Hi All,

This is just a heads up to people testing python-2.3.2 in portage. 
After some persuasion, I've decided to make UCS4 the default unicode
implementation starting from python-2.3.2-r2. That means if you were
testing 2.3.2-r1, you will need to re-run python-updater so it fixes the
missing PyUnicodeUCS2_* symbols in certain modules.

To do that you should use:

/usr/portage/dev-lang/python/files/python-updater -o 2.3

(Add -p to the options if you want to make sure it will do the right
thing)

Note that if you are upgrading from python-2.2.*, then you should just
run python-updater without any options:

/usr/portage/dev-lang/python/files/python-updater

Hopefully, this should be the last revision before we can remove it from
p.mask. Although this has to happen after portage-2.0.49-r16 gets
unmasked.

Cheers,
-- 
Alastair 'liquidx' Tse
 >> Gentoo Developer
 >> http://www.liquidx.net/ | http://dev.gentoo.org/~liquidx/


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Re: [gentoo-dev] python-2.3.2-r2 changes

[Aron Griffis]

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LiquidX wrote:	[Sat Nov 22 2003, 10:11:32AM EST]
> This is just a heads up to people testing python-2.3.2 in portage. 
> After some persuasion, I've decided to make UCS4 the default unicode
> implementation starting from python-2.3.2-r2. That means if you were
> testing 2.3.2-r1, you will need to re-run python-updater so it fixes the
> missing PyUnicodeUCS2_* symbols in certain modules.

Could you give a quick run-down on the difference between UCS2 and UCS4
and what this change buys us?  If it's been discussed in a thread which
I missed, a pointer to the archived thread would be sufficient.

Thanks,
Aron

-- 
Aron Griffis
Gentoo Linux Developer (alpha / ia64 / ruby / vim)
Key fingerprint = E3B6 8734 C2D6 B5E5 AE76  FB3A 26B1 C5E3 2010 4EB0


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Re: [gentoo-dev] python-2.3.2-r2 changes

[Alastair Tse]

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On Sat, 2003-11-22 at 21:08, Aron Griffis wrote:
> Could you give a quick run-down on the difference between UCS2 and UCS4
> and what this change buys us?  If it's been discussed in a thread which
> I missed, a pointer to the archived thread would be sufficient.
> 

This was the initial thread:

http://article.gmane.org/gmane.linux.gentoo.devel/13751

Anyway, just a quick run down. Basically, Gentoo's python-2.2 used UCS2
as default for the unicode internal representation. That means using a
16bit word for each unicode character. There were bugs with 2.2's UCS4
implementation though. They have been fixed in 2.3 and it is mature
enough to be used as standard.

UCS4 is pretty popular standard for implementing unicode. For example,
glib has no UCS2 support and only supports UCS4. Another reason for
sticking with UCS4 is that it is recommended by the Python devs and is
being adopted by the other distros like Redhat (>=9) and Debian
(unstable)[3] for python-2.3. In fact, as far as I know, wchar in Linux
defaults to 4 bytes anyway.

I initially had doubts about UCS4 but from my tests[1], unless an
application uses unicode extensively, the memory footprint doesn't grow.
For example, emerge took pretty much the same memory (actually 160k
less).

So in the long run, I think aligning ourselves with UCS4 support in
Python will decrease the hassles in the future. For a more professional
(and detailed) treatment of the subject, you might like to read PEP261
[2].

Hope that answers your questions.

Cheers,

Alastair


[1] http://article.gmane.org/gmane.linux.gentoo.devel/13842/match=python
[2] 
http://www.python.org/peps/pep-0261.html
[3] http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2003-June/036458.html
> Thanks,
> Aron
-- 
Alastair 'liquidx' Tse
 >> Gentoo Developer
 >> http://www.liquidx.net/ | http://dev.gentoo.org/~liquidx/


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