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This is Python release 1.3 ========================== What's new in this release? --------------------------- - Keyword parameters (see the last chapter of the tutorial). - Third argument to raise (the stacktrace to provide). - Faster function and method calls. - Jim Fulton's abstract object interface (Include/abstract.h). - Support for Tk 4.0 in Tkinter (Tkinter now supports keywords!). - Rewritten htmllib.py (HTML parser), with new formatter.py. - Rewritten rexec.py (restricted execution). - New modules ni.py and ihooks.py (package support and more). - And lots more that you'll have to discover on your own (see chapter 12 of the Tutorial). What is Python anyway? ---------------------- Python is an interpreted object-oriented programming language, and is often compared to Tcl, Perl or Scheme. For a quick summary of what Python can mean for a UNIX/C programmer, read Misc/BLURB.LUTZ. If you don't read instructions ------------------------------ Congratulations on getting this far. :-) To start building right away (on UNIX): type "./configure" in the current directory and when it finishes, type "make". The section Build Instructions below is still recommended reading. :-) Copyright issues ---------------- Python is COPYRIGHTED but free to use for all. See the full copyright notice at the end of this file. The Python distribution is *not* affected by the GNU Public Licence (GPL). There are interfaces to some GNU code but these are entirely optional and no GNU code is distributed with Python. For all these packages, GPL-free public domain versions also exist. A modest plug ============= ************************************************************************* * * * Python exists, and is free, thanks to the contributed efforts * * of many people. The PSA was created to maximize the results * * of those efforts, by helping to coordinate them. The PSA * * operates web, ftp and email servers, organizes Python * * workshops, and engages in other activities that benefit the * * Python user community. The PSA is seeking support for these * * activities. See this URL for information on how to join: * * http://www.python.org/psa/Joining.html * * * ************************************************************************* Build instructions ================== Before you start building Python, you must first configure it. This entails (at least) running the script "./configure", which figures out your system configuration and creates several Makefiles. (It takes a minute or two -- please be patient!) When it's done, you are ready to run make. Typing "make" in the toplevel directory will recursively run make in each of the subdirectories Parser, Objects, Python and Modules, creating a library file in each one. The executable of the interpreter is built in the Modules subdirectory and moved up here when it is built. If you want or need to, you can also chdir into each subdirectory in turn and run make there manually (do the Modules subdirectory last!). NOTE: if you rerun the configure script with different options, remove all object files by running "make clean" before rebuilding. Believe it or not, "make clean" sometimes helps to clean up other inexplicable problems as well. Try it before sending in a bug report! Troubleshooting --------------- If you run into trouble, see section 3 of the FAQ (file Misc/FAQ) for hints on what can go wrong, and how to fix it. Platform specific notes ----------------------- (Some of these may no longer apply. If you find you can build Python on these platforms without the special directions mentioned here, let me know so I can remove them!) AIX: Read the file Misc/AIX-NOTES before trying to build. HP-UX: Read the file Misc/HPUX-NOTES if you want to be able to use shared libraries for dynamically loaded modules. Minix: When using ack, use "CC=cc AR=aal RANLIB=: ./configure"! SCO: 1) Everything works much better if you add -U__STDC__ to the defs. This is because all the SCO header files are broken. Anything that isn't mentioned in the C standard it's conditionally excluded when __STDC__ is defined. 2) Due to the U.S. export restrictions, SCO broke the crypt stuff out into a separate library, libcrypt_i.a so the LIBS needed be set to: LIBS=' -lsocket -lcrypt_i' Configuring the set of built-in modules --------------------------------------- You can configure the interpreter to contain fewer or more built-in modules by editing the file Modules/Setup. This file is initially copied (when the toplevel Makefile makes Modules/Makefile for the first time) from Setup.in; if it does not exist yet, make a copy yourself. Never edit Setup.in -- always edit Setup. Read the comments in the file for information on what kind of edits you can make. When you have edited Setup, Makefile and config.c in Modules will automatically be rebuilt the next time you run make in the toplevel directory. Especially on SGI IRIX, there are modules that interface to many SGI specific system libraries, e.g. the GL library and the audio hardware. Setting the optimization/debugging options ------------------------------------------ If you want to change the optimization/debugging options for the C compiler, assign to the OPT variable on the toplevel make command; e.g. "make OPT=-g" will build a debugging version of Python on most platforms. The default is OPT=-O; a value for OPT in the environment when the configure script is run overrides this default (likewise for CC; and the initial value for LIBS is used as the base set of libraries to link with). Testing ------- To test the interpreter that you have just built, type "make test". This runs the test set silently, twice (once with no compiled files, once with the compiled files left by the previous test run). Each test run should print "All tests OK." and nothing more. (The test set does not test the built-in modules, but will find most other problems with the interpreter.) IMPORTANT: If the tests fail and you decide to mail a bug report, *don't* include the output of "make test". It is useless. Run the following command instead: PYTHONPATH=../Lib:../Lib/test:./Modules ./python -c 'import testall' (substituting the top of the source tree for .. if you built in a different directory). This gives the output of the tests and shows which test failed. Installing ---------- To install the interpreter as /usr/local/bin/python, type "make install". To install the library as /usr/local/lib/python, type "make libinstall". To install the manual page as /usr/local/man/man1/python.1, type "make maninstall". To install the Emacs editing mode for python, manually copy the file Misc/python-mode.el to your local Emacs lisp directory. The directory /usr/local can be overridden at configuration time by passing --prefix=DIRECTORY to the configure script, or at make time by passing "prefix=DIRECTORY" to make. See below for more information on --prefix. If you plan to do development of extension modules or to embed Python in another application and don't want to reference the original source tree, you can type "make inclinstall" and "make libainstall" to install the include files and lib*.a files, respectively, as /usr/local/include/Py/*.h and /usr/local/lib/python/lib/lib*.a. The make libainstall target also installs copies of several other files used or produced during the build process which are needed to build extensions or to generate their Makefiles. Configuration options and variables ----------------------------------- Some special cases are handled by passing environment variables or options to the configure script. NOTE: if you rerun the configure script with different options, remove all object files by running "make clean" before rebuilding. --with(out)-gcc: The configure script uses gcc (the GNU C compiler) if it finds it. If you don't want this, or if this compiler is installed but broken on your platform, pass the option --without-gcc. You can also pass "CC=cc" (or whatever the name of the proper C compiler is) in the environment, but the advantage of using --without-gcc is that this option is remembered by the config.status script for its --recheck option. --prefix, --exec-prefix: If you want to install the binaries and the Python library somewhere else than in /usr/local/{bin,lib}, you can pass the option --prefix=DIRECTORY; the interpreter binary will be installed as DIRECTORY/bin/python and the library files as DIRECTORY/lib/python/*. If you pass --exec-prefix=DIRECTORY (as well) this overrides the installation prefix for architecture-dependent files (like the interpreter binary). Note that --prefix=DIRECTORY also affects the default module search path (sys.path), when Modules/config.c is compiled. Passing make the option prefix=DIRECTORY (and/or exec_prefix=DIRECTORY) overrides the prefix set at configuration time; this may be more convenient than re-running the configure script if you change your mind about the install prefix... --with-readline: You can use the GNU readline library to improve the interactive user interface: this gives you line editing and command history when calling python interactively. You need to configure build the GNU readline library before running the configure script. Its sources are not distributed with Python; you can ftp them from any GNU mirror site, or from its home site: <URL:ftp://slc2.ins.cwru.edu/pub/dist/readline-2.0.tar.gz> (or a higher version number -- using version 1.x is not recommended). A GPL-free version was posted to comp.sources.misc in volume 31 and is widely available from FTP archive sites, e.g. <URL:ftp://gatekeeper.dec.com/.b/usenet/comp.sources.misc/ volume31/editline/part01.Z> Pass the Python configure script the option --with-readline=DIRECTORY where DIRECTORY is the absolute pathname of the directory where you've built the readline library. Some hints on building and using the readline library are in the FAQ (file Misc/FAQ). --with-thread: On SGI IRIX, and on Sun SOLARIS 2, you can use multiple threads. To enable this, pass --with-thread. In the Modules/Setup file, enable the thread module. (Threads aren't enabled automatically because there are run-time penalties when support for them is compiled in even if you don't use them.) --with-sgi-dl: On SGI IRIX 4, dynamic loading of extension modules is supported by the "dl" library by Jack Jansen, which is ftp'able from <URL:ftp://ftp.cwi.nl/pub/dynload/dl-1.6.tar.Z>. This is enabled (after you've ftp'ed and compiled the dl library!) by passing --with-sgi-dl=DIRECTORY where DIRECTORY is the absolute pathname of the dl library. (Don't bother on IRIX 5, it already has dynamic linking using SunOS style shared libraries.) Support for this feature is deprecated. --with-dl-dld: Dynamic loading of modules is rumoured to be supported on some other systems: VAX (Ultrix), Sun3 (SunOS 3.4), Sequent Symmetry (Dynix), and Atari ST. This is done using a combination of the GNU dynamic loading package (<URL:ftp://ftp.cwi.nl/pub/dynload/dl-dld-1.1.tar.Z>) and an emulation of the SGI dl library mentioned above (the emulation can be found at <URL:ftp://ftp.cwi.nl/pub/dynload/dld-3.2.3.tar.Z>). To enable this, ftp and compile both libraries, then call the configure passing it the option --with-dl-dld=DL_DIRECTORY,DLD_DIRECTORY where DL_DIRECTORY is the absolute pathname of the dl emulation library and DLD_DIRECTORY is the absolute pathname of the GNU dld library. (Don't bother on SunOS 4 or 5, they already have dynamic linking using shared libraries.) Support for this feature is deprecated. --with-libm, --with-libc: It is possible to specify alternative versions for the Math library (default -lm) and the C library (default the empty string) using the options --with-libm=STRING and --with-libc=STRING, respectively. E.g. if your system requires that you pass -lc_s to the C compiler to use the shared C library, you can pass --with-libc=-lc_s. These libraries are passed after all other libraries, the C library last. Extensions ---------- You can also build an "extended" interpreter, using modules that are not contained in the Modules directory. Extensions are distributed as a separate tar file (currently extensions.tar.gz). See the README file there. Building for multiple architectures (using the VPATH feature) ------------------------------------------------------------- If your file system is shared between multiple architectures, it usually is not necessary to make copies of the sources for each architecture you want to support. If the make program supports the VPATH feature, you can create an empty build directory for each architecture, and in each directory run the configure script (on the appropriate machine with the appropriate options). This creates the necessary subdirectories and the Makefiles therein. The Makefiles contain a line VPATH=... which points to directory containing the actual sources. (On SGI systems, use "smake" instead of "make" if you use VPATH -- don't try gnumake.) For example, the following is all you need to build a minimal Python in /usr/tmp/python (assuming ~guido/src/python is the toplevel directory and you want to build in /usr/tmp/python): $ mkdir /usr/tmp/python $ cd /usr/tmp/python $ ~guido/src/python/configure [...] $ make [...] $ Note that Modules/Makefile copies the original Setup file to the build directory if it finds no Setup file there. This means that you can edit the Setup file for each architecture independently. For this reason, subsequent changes to the original Setup file are not tracked automatically, as they might overwrite local changes. To force a copy of a changed original Setup file, delete the target Setup file. (The makesetup script supports multiple input files, so if you want to be fancy you can change the rules to create an empty Setup.local if it doesn't exist and run it with arguments $(srcdir)/Setup Setup.local; however this assumes that you only need to add modules.) Building on non-UNIX systems ---------------------------- On non-UNIX systems, you will have to fake the effect of running the configure script manually. A good start is to copy the file config.h.in to config.h and edit the latter to reflect the actual configuration of your system. Most symbols must simply be defined as 1 only if the corresponding feature is present and can be left alone otherwise; however RETSIGTYPE must always be defined, either as int or as void, and the *_t type symbols must be defined as some variant of int if they need to be defined at all. Then arrange that the symbol HAVE_CONFIG_H is defined during compilation (usually by passing an argument of the form `-DHAVE_CONFIG_H' to the compiler, but this is necessarily system-dependent). I have tried to collect instructions, Makefiles and additional sources for various platforms in this release. The following directories exist: Mac/ Apple Macintosh, using THINK C 6.0 or MPW 3.2. Dos/ MS-DOS and Windows 3.1, using Microsoft C. Nt/ Windows NT, using Microsoft Visual C/C++. Os2/ OS/2. Most of these instructions were last tested with a previous Python release, so you may still experience occasional problems. If you have fixes or suggestions, please let me know and I'll try to incorporate them in the next release. Miscellaneous issues ==================== Documentation ------------- All documentation is provided in the subdirectory Doc in the form of LaTeX files. In order of importance for new users: Tutorial (tut), Library Reference (lib), Language Reference (ref), Extending (ext). Especially the Library Reference is of immense value since much of Python's power (including the built-in data types and functions!) is described here. To print the documentation from the LaTeX files, chdir into the Doc subdirectory, type "make" (let's hope you have LaTeX installed!), and send the four resulting PostScript files (tut.ps, lib.ps, ref.ps, and ext.ps) to the printer. See the README file there. All documentation is also available on-line via the World-Wide Web (WWW): <URL:http://www.cwi.nl/~guido/Python.html>. It can also be downloaded separately from the ftp archives (see below) in Emacs INFO, HTML or PostScript form -- see the FAQ (file Misc/FAQ) for more info. Emacs mode ---------- There's an excellent Emacs editing mode for Python code; see the file Misc/python-mode.el. Originally written by Tim Peters, who's no longer on the net, it is now maintained by Barry Warsaw <bwarsaw@cnri.reston.va.com>. BTW, if you want to use font-lock for Python sources, here's something to put in your .emacs file: (defun my-python-mode-hook () (setq font-lock-keywords python-font-lock-keywords) (font-lock-mode 1)) (add-hook 'python-mode-hook 'my-python-mode-hook) Bug reports ----------- Bugs are best reported to the comp.lang.python newsgroup or the Python mailing list -- see the section "Newsgroup and mailing list" below. Before posting, read the FAQ (file Misc/FAQ) first to see if your problem has already been answered! Ftp access ---------- Python's "home ftp site" is ftp.cwi.nl, directory pub/python. See the FAQ (file Misc/FAQ) for a list of other ftp sites carrying the Python distribution. Newsgroup and mailing list -------------------------- There are a newsgroup and a mailing list devoted to Python programming, design and bugs. The newsgroup, comp.lang.python, contains exactly the same messages as the mailing list. To subscribe to the mailing list, send mail containing your real name and e-mail address to "python-list-request@cwi.nl" (a real person reads these messages, so no LISTPROC or Majordomo commands, please). The Tk interface ---------------- Tk (the user interface component of John Ousterhout's Tcl language) is also usable from Python. Since this requires that you first build and install Tcl/Tk, the Tk interface is not enabled by default. It requires Tcl 7.4 and Tk 4.0. (Support for Tk 3.6 and Tcl 7.3 can be found in Lib/tk3inter/.) To enable the Python/Tk interface, once you've built and installed Tcl/Tk, all you need to do is edit two lines in Modules/Setup; search for the string "tkinter". Un-comment one (normally the first) of the lines beginning with "#tkinter" and un-comment the line beginning with "#TKPATH". (If you have installed Tcl/Tk in unusual places you will have to edit the first line as well to fix the -I and -L options.) See the Build Instructions above for more details. There is little documentation. Begin with fetching the "Tk Lifesaver" document, e.g. <URL:ftp://ftp.cwi.nl/pub/python/doc/tkinter-doc.tar.gz> (a gzipped tar file containing a PostScript file). There are demos in the Demo/tkinter directory, in the subdirectories guido, matt and www. Note that there's a Python module called "Tkinter" (capital T) which lives in Lib/tkinter/Tkinter.py, and a C module called "tkinter" (lower case t) which lives in Modules/tkintermodule.c. Demos and normal Tk applications only import the Python Tkinter module -- only the latter uses the C tkinter module directly. In order to find the C tkinter module, it must be compiled and linked into the Python interpreter -- the tkinter line in the Setup file does this. In order to find the Python Tkinter module, sys.path must be set correctly -- the TKPATH assignment in the Setup file takes care of this, but only if you install Python properly ("make install libinstall"). (You can also use dynamic loading for the C tkinter module, in which case you must manually fix up sys.path or set $PYTHONPATH for the Python Tkinter module.) See <URL:http://www.smli.com/research/tcl/> for more info on where to get Tcl/Tk. Distribution structure ---------------------- Most subdirectories have their own README file. Most files have comments. ChangeLog A raw list of changes since the first 1.0.0 BETA release Contrib/ Interesting or useful Python code contributed by others Demo/ Demonstration scripts, modules and programs Doc/ Documentation (LaTeX sources) Extensions/ Extension modules (distributed separately) Grammar/ Input for the parser generator Include/ Public header files Lib/ Python library modules Makefile.in Source from which config.status creates Makefile Misc/ Miscellaneous files Modules/ Implementation of most built-in modules Objects/ Implementation of most built-in object types Parser/ The parser and tokenizer and their input handling Python/ The "compiler" and interpreter README The file you're reading now Tools/ Some useful programs written in Python acconfig.h Additional input for the autoheader program config.h.in Source from which config.status creates config.h configure Configuration shell script (GNU autoconf output) configure.in Configuration specification (GNU autoconf input) The following files will (may) be created in the toplevel directory by the configuration and build processes: Makefile Build rules config.cache cache of configuration variables config.h Configuration header config.log log from last configure run config.status status from last run of configure script python The executable interpreter tags, TAGS Tags files for vi and Emacs Author's address ---------------- Guido van Rossum CWI, dept. CST P.O. Box 94079 1090 GB Amsterdam The Netherlands E-mail: guido@cwi.nl Copyright notice ================ The Python source is copyrighted, but you can freely use and copy it as long as you don't change or remove the copyright notice: ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright 1991-1995 by Stichting Mathematisch Centrum, Amsterdam, The Netherlands. All Rights Reserved Permission to use, copy, modify, and distribute this software and its documentation for any purpose and without fee is hereby granted, provided that the above copyright notice appear in all copies and that both that copyright notice and this permission notice appear in supporting documentation, and that the names of Stichting Mathematisch Centrum or CWI not be used in advertising or publicity pertaining to distribution of the software without specific, written prior permission. STICHTING MATHEMATISCH CENTRUM DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES WITH REGARD TO THIS SOFTWARE, INCLUDING ALL IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS, IN NO EVENT SHALL STICHTING MATHEMATISCH CENTRUM BE LIABLE FOR ANY SPECIAL, INDIRECT OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES OR ANY DAMAGES WHATSOEVER RESULTING FROM LOSS OF USE, DATA OR PROFITS, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, NEGLIGENCE OR OTHER TORTIOUS ACTION, ARISING OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE USE OR PERFORMANCE OF THIS SOFTWARE. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- --Guido van Rossum, CWI, Amsterdam <mailto:guido@cwi.nl> <http://www.cwi.nl/~guido/>