Lawrence D'Oliveiro
3/26/2010 10:06:00 PM
In message <mailman.1215.1269608278.23598.python-list@python.org>, Philip
Semanchuk wrote:
> On Mar 26, 2010, at 5:57 AM, Laszlo Nagy wrote:
>>
>> On my Linux system: Python version: 2.6.2 sqlite3.sqlite_version:
>> 3.6.10
>> On my Windows system: Python version: 2.6.5 sqlite3.sqlite_version:
>> 3.5.9
>>
>> Why is that?
>
> The few Linux distros that I checked are much more aggressive about
> bundling newer versions of SQLite. For instance, Ubuntu 8.04 has
> Python 2.5.2 with SQLite 3.4.2, while Ubuntu 8.10 has the same version
> of Python but offers SQLite 3.5.9.
>
> You asked "why" and I don't know. I imagine it comes down to
> philosophical differences or maybe just a lack of time to test when
> building new WIndows distros for Python.org.
Maybe the issues are more practical than philosophical. Linux distros use an
integrated package manager and are maintained by a cohesive community. What
that means is that the SQLite package isnâ??t just used by Python, but by a
bunch of other stuff as well. So all the maintainers of those packages have
an interest in making sure that SQLite doesnâ??t break them.
Whereas on Windows, the Python download has to include _all_ its
dependencies, it cannot rely on a system-integrated package manager to
automatically provide them. And the same is true for every other open-source
package that anyone tries to pre-build for Windows. So they all have to
provide their own installation routines, their own updates, their own
testing ... in short, a lot of duplication of effort. This is expensive.