PEP 370 question

P

Paul Melis

In (the recently accepted) PEP 370 it says

"Current Python versions don't have a unified way to install packages
into the home directory of a user (except for Mac Framework builds).
Users are either forced to ask the system administrator to install or
update a package for them or to use one of the many workarounds like
Virtual Python [1], Working Env [2] or Virtual Env [3].

[...]

The feature can't be implemented using the environment variable
PYTHONPATH. The env var just inserts a new directory to the beginning of
sys.path but it doesn't parse the pth files in the directory. A full
blown site-packages path is required for several applications and Python
eggs."

I'm confused. For years I've been installing packages and extension
modules locally using distutils's --prefix option, e.g. using

python setup.py install --prefix=$HOME/local

Together with adding $HOME/local/lib/python2.4/site-package to my
PYTHONPATH this works fine, even if there are packages that require a
..pth file to work or that use Eggs (like setuptools and pygments).

So what limitation does the quoted paragraph in the PEP refer to?

Regards,
Paul
 

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