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  • Python release 1.2
    ==================
    
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    ==> This version provides new functionality as well as bug fixes.
        Everyone should upgrade.  For a description of what's changed, see
        Misc/NEWS.
    
    
    ==> If you don't know yet what Python is: it's an interpreted,
        extensible, embeddable, interactive, object-oriented programming
        language.  For a quick summary of what Python can mean for a
        UNIX/C programmer, read Misc/BLURB.LUTZ.
    
    
    ==> If you want to start compiling right away (on UNIX): just type
        "./configure" in the current directory and when it finishes, type
        "make".  See the section Build Instructions below for more
        details.
    
    
    ==> All documentation is 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).  Note that especially the Library Reference is of immense
        value since much of Python's power (including the built-in data
    
        types and functions!) is described there.  [NB The ext document
    
        has not been updated to reflect this release yet.]
    
    ==> Python is COPYRIGHTED but free to use for all.  See the copyright
    
        notice at the end of this file.  Moreover, the Python distribution
        is not affected by the GNU Public Licence (GPL).  There is support
        for interfaces to some GNU code but this is entirely optional and
        no GNU code is distributed with Python.  For all these packages,
        GPL-free public domain versions also exist.
    
    
    
    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.  (This will
    take a minute or two -- please be patient!)  When it is 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 but
    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!).  If you run into trouble, first
    see the section Troubleshooting later in this file.
    
    AIX users: read the file Misc/AIX-NOTES before trying to build.
    
    
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    HP-UX users: read the file Misc/HPUX-NOTES if you want to be able to
    use shared libraries for dynamically loaded modules.
    
    
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    DEC Alpha users: unless you like debugging GCC, pass "--without-gcc"
    to the configure script.
    
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    Minix users: when using ack, use "CC=cc AR=aal RANLIB=: ./configure"!
    
    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
    
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    toplevel directory.
    
    
    If you want to change the optimization level of the build, assign to
    the OPT variable on the toplevel make command; e.g. "make OPT=-g" will
    
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    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).
    
    
    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.)
    
    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.
    
    To print the documentation, cd 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; you can also build a texinfo version of the
    library manual and from that construct an Emacs info version (the
    hypertext format used by the Emacs "info" command) and an HTML version
    (the hypertext format used by the World Wide Web distributed
    information initiative).  You don't need to have LaTeX installed for
    this.  Note that the Python archive sites also carry the resulting
    PostScript files, in case you have a PostScript printer but not LaTeX.
    
    Some special cases are handled by passing environment variables or
    options to the configure script:
    
    - 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.
    
    - On SCO, a number of notes apply:
    
    	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'
    
    
    
    - 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...
    
    
    - 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:
    
        - If you have already built Python without readline and then
        decide to add it, you have to rerun configure adding the
        --with-readline flag, AND you have to remove the object file
        Modules/myreadline.o (same if you go the other way)
    
    
        - On SGI IRIX 5, you may have to add the following
        to rldefs.h:
    
    	#ifndef sigmask
    	#define sigmask(sig)	(1L << ((sig)-1))
    	#endif
    
    
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        - On most systems, you will have to add #include "rldefs.h" to the
        top of several source files, and if you use the VPATH feature, you
        will have to add dependencies of the form foo.o: foo.c to the
        Makefile for several values of foo.
    
    
        - The readline library requires use of the termcap library.  A
        known problem with this is that it contains entry points which
        cause conflicts with the STDWIN and SGI GL libraries.  The stdwin
        conflict can be solved (and will be, in the next release of
        stdwin) by adding a line saying '#define werase w_erase' to the
        stdwin.h file (in the stdwin distribution, subdirectory H).  The
        GL conflict has been solved in the Python configure script by a
        hack that forces use of the static version of the termcap library.
    
        - Check the newsgroup gnu.bash.bugs for specific problems with the
    
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        readline library (I don't get this group here but I've been told
        that it is the place for readline bugs.)
    
    
    - 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.)
    
    - On SGI IRIX, there are modules that interface to many SGI specific
    system libraries, e.g. the GL library and the audio hardware.  To
    enable these modules, you must edit the Modules/Setup file (or copy the
    Setup.irix4 file to it).
    
    - 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
    
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    linking using SunOS style shared libraries.)  Support for this feature
    is deprecated.
    
    
    - 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
    
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    libraries.)  Support for this feature is deprecated.
    
    
    - 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.
    
    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.Z).  See the README file
    there.
    
    
    
    The Tk extension
    ----------------
    
    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 7.3 and Tk 3.6.  For more info about Tk, including
    pointers to the source, see John Ousterhout's home page at
    <URL:http://playground.sun.com/~ouster/>.
    
    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 "Tk".  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/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.)
    
    
    
    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.)
    
    
    Troubleshooting
    ---------------
    
    
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    See section 3 of the FAQ (in subdirectory Misc of the distribution)
    for hints on what can go wrong, and how to fix it.
    
    
    
    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).
    
    
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    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.
    
    
    
    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
    Demo/		Demonstration scripts, modules and programs
    Doc/		Documentation (in LaTeX)
    
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    Extensions/	Extension modules (distributed separately)
    
    Grammar/	Input for the parser generator
    Include/	Public header files
    Lib/		Python library modules
    Makefile	Rules for building the distribution
    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	Configuration header (generated)
    config.h.in	Source from which config.status creates config.h
    config.status	status from last run of configure script (generated)
    configure	Configuration shell script (GNU autoconf output)
    configure.in	Configuration specification (GNU autoconf input)
    tags, TAGS	Tags files for vi and Emacs (generated)
    python		The executable interpreter (generated)
    
    
    Ftp access
    ----------
    
    
    The latest Python source distribution can be ftp'ed from
    
    <URL:ftp://ftp.cwi.nl/pub/python/>.  See the INDEX or index.html file
    for more information.  You can also find PostScript of the main Python
    documentation there, Macintosh and PC binaries, and the latest STDWIN
    source distribution (in directory /pub/stdwin).  oFr mirror sites, see
    the list in the FAQ (Misc/FAQ this directory).
    
    
    
    Mailing list and Newsgroup
    --------------------------
    
    There are a mailing list and a newsgroup 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 in Internet form to "python-list-request@cwi.nl".
    
    
    
    Author
    ------
    
    Guido van Rossum
    CWI, dept. CST
    P.O. Box 94079
    1090 GB  Amsterdam
    The Netherlands
    
    E-mail: Guido.van.Rossum@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:
    
    
    Copyright 1991-1995 by Stichting Mathematisch Centrum, Amsterdam,
    The Netherlands.
    
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    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
    
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    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.
    
    
    Signature
    ---------
    
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    --Guido van Rossum, CWI, Amsterdam <Guido.van.Rossum@cwi.nl>
    
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    <URL:http://www.cwi.nl/cwi/people/Guido.van.Rossum.html>