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  • This is Python 3000 -- unversioned (branched off 2.5 pre alpha 1)
    =================================================================
    
    Copyright (c) 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006 Python Software Foundation.
    
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    Copyright (c) 2000 BeOpen.com.
    All rights reserved.
    
    
    Copyright (c) 1995-2001 Corporation for National Research Initiatives.
    
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    All rights reserved.
    
    
    Copyright (c) 1991-1995 Stichting Mathematisch Centrum.
    
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    All rights reserved.
    
    
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    License information
    -------------------
    
    
    See the file "LICENSE" for information on the history of this
    software, terms & conditions for usage, and a DISCLAIMER OF ALL
    WARRANTIES.
    
    This Python distribution contains no GNU General Public Licensed
    (GPLed) code so it may be used in proprietary projects just like prior
    Python distributions.  There are interfaces to some GNU code but these
    are entirely optional.
    
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    All trademarks referenced herein are property of their respective
    holders.
    
    What's new in this release?
    ---------------------------
    
    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".  This creates an
    executable "./python"; to install in /usr/local, first do "su root"
    and then "make install".
    
    
    The section `Build instructions' below is still recommended reading.
    
    What is Python anyway?
    ----------------------
    
    
    Python is an interpreted, interactive object-oriented programming
    language suitable (amongst other uses) for distributed application
    development, scripting, numeric computing and system testing.  Python
    is often compared to Tcl, Perl, Java, JavaScript, Visual Basic or
    Scheme.  To find out more about what Python can do for you, point your
    browser to http://www.python.org/.
    
    How do I learn Python?
    ----------------------
    
    
    The official tutorial is still a good place to start; see
    
    http://docs.python.org/ for online and downloadable versions, as well
    as a list of other introductions, and reference documentation.
    
    
    There's a quickly growing set of books on Python.  See
    
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    http://wiki.python.org/moin/PythonBooks for a list.
    
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    Documentation
    -------------
    
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    All documentation is provided online in a variety of formats.  In
    order of importance for new users: Tutorial, Library Reference,
    
    Language Reference, Extending & Embedding, and the Python/C API.  The
    Library Reference is especially of immense value since much of
    Python's power is described there, including the built-in data types
    and functions!
    
    All documentation is also available online at the Python web site
    
    (http://docs.python.org/, see below).  It is available online for
    
    occasional reference, or can be downloaded in many formats for faster
    
    access.  The documentation is available in HTML, PostScript, PDF, and
    LaTeX formats; the LaTeX version is primarily for documentation
    authors, translators, and people with special formatting requirements.
    
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    Unfortunately, new-style classes (new in Python 2.2) have not yet been
    
    integrated into Python's standard documentation.  A collection of
    
    pointers to what has been written is at:
    
        http://www.python.org/doc/newstyle.html
    
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    New Python releases and related technologies are published at
    
    http://www.python.org/.  Come visit us!
    
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    There's also a Python community web site at
    http://starship.python.net/.
    
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    Newsgroups and Mailing Lists
    ----------------------------
    
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    Read comp.lang.python, a high-volume discussion newsgroup about
    Python, or comp.lang.python.announce, a low-volume moderated newsgroup
    for Python-related announcements.  These are also accessible as
    
    mailing lists: see http://www.python.org/community/lists.html for an
    overview of these and many other Python-related mailing lists.
    
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    Archives are accessible via the Google Groups Usenet archive; see
    
    http://groups.google.com/.  The mailing lists are also archived, see
    
    http://www.python.org/community/lists.html for details.
    
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    Bug reports
    -----------
    
    
    To report or search for bugs, please use the Python Bug
    Tracker at http://sourceforge.net/bugs/?group_id=5470.
    
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    Patches and contributions
    -------------------------
    
    
    To submit a patch or other contribution, please use the Python Patch
    Manager at http://sourceforge.net/patch/?group_id=5470.  Guidelines
    for patch submission may be found at http://www.python.org/patches/.
    
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    If you have a proposal to change Python, it's best to submit a Python
    Enhancement Proposal (PEP) first.  All current PEPs, as well as
    
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    guidelines for submitting a new PEP, are listed at
    
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    Questions
    ---------
    
    For help, if you can't find it in the manuals or on the web site, it's
    best to post to the comp.lang.python or the Python mailing list (see
    above).  If you specifically don't want to involve the newsgroup or
    
    mailing list, send questions to help@python.org (a group of volunteers
    who answer questions as they can).  The newsgroup is the most
    efficient way to ask public questions.
    
    Build instructions
    
    ==================
    
    Before you can build Python, you must first configure it.
    Fortunately, the configuration and build process has been automated
    for Unix and Linux installations, so all you usually have to do is
    type a few commands and sit back.  There are some platforms where
    things are not quite as smooth; see the platform specific notes below.
    If you want to build for multiple platforms sharing the same source
    tree, see the section on VPATH below.
    
    Start by running the script "./configure", which determines your
    system configuration and creates the Makefile.  (It takes a minute or
    two -- please be patient!)  You may want to pass options to the
    configure script -- see the section below on configuration options and
    variables.  When it's done, you are ready to run make.
    
    To build Python, you normally type "make" in the toplevel directory.
    If you have changed the configuration, the Makefile may have to be
    rebuilt.  In this case you may have to run make again to correctly
    build your desired target.  The interpreter executable is built in the
    top level directory.
    
    
    Once you have built a Python interpreter, see the subsections below on
    
    testing and installation.  If you run into trouble, see the next
    section.
    
    Previous versions of Python used a manual configuration process that
    involved editing the file Modules/Setup.  While this file still exists
    and manual configuration is still supported, it is rarely needed any
    more: almost all modules are automatically built as appropriate under
    guidance of the setup.py script, which is run by Make after the
    interpreter has been built.
    
    Troubleshooting
    ---------------
    
    
    See also the platform specific notes in the next section.
    
    
    If you run into other trouble, see the FAQ
    (http://www.python.org/doc/faq) for hints on what can go wrong, and
    how to fix it.
    
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    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!
    
    
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    If the configure script fails or doesn't seem to find things that
    
    should be there, inspect the config.log file.
    
    
    If you get a warning for every file about the -Olimit option being no
    longer supported, you can ignore it.  There's no foolproof way to know
    
    whether this option is needed; all we can do is test whether it is
    
    accepted without error.  On some systems, e.g. older SGI compilers, it
    is essential for performance (specifically when compiling ceval.c,
    which has more basic blocks than the default limit of 1000).  If the
    warning bothers you, edit the Makefile to remove "-Olimit 1500" from
    the OPT variable.
    
    If you get failures in test_long, or sys.maxint gets set to -1, you
    are probably experiencing compiler bugs, usually related to
    
    optimization.  This is a common problem with some versions of gcc, and
    some vendor-supplied compilers, which can sometimes be worked around
    by turning off optimization.  Consider switching to stable versions
    
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    (gcc 2.95.2, gcc 3.x, or contact your vendor.)
    
    
    From Python 2.0 onward, all Python C code is ANSI C.  Compiling using
    old K&R-C-only compilers is no longer possible.  ANSI C compilers are
    available for all modern systems, either in the form of updated
    
    compilers from the vendor, or one of the free compilers (gcc).
    
    Unsupported systems
    -------------------
    
    
    A number of features are not supported in Python 2.5 anymore. Some
    support code is still present, but will be removed in Python 2.6. 
    
    If you still need to use current Python versions on these systems,
    please send a message to python-dev@python.org indicating that you
    
    volunteer to support this system. For a more detailed discussion 
    regarding no-longer-supported and resupporting platforms, as well
    as a list of platforms that became or will be unsupported, see PEP 11.
    
    
    More specifically, the following systems are not supported any
    longer:
    - SunOS 4
    - DYNIX
    - dgux
    - Minix
    
    - Irix 4 and --with-sgi-dl
    - Linux 1
    - Systems defining __d6_pthread_create (configure.in)
    - Systems defining PY_PTHREAD_D4, PY_PTHREAD_D6,
      or PY_PTHREAD_D7 in thread_pthread.h
    - Systems using --with-dl-dld
    
    - Systems using --without-universal-newlines
    
    - MacOS 9
    
    The following systems are still supported in Python 2.5, but
    support will be dropped in 2.6:
    - Systems using --with-wctype-functions
    - Win9x, WinME
    
    Warning on install in Windows 98 and Windows Me
    -----------------------------------------------
    
    Following Microsoft's closing of Extended Support for
    Windows 98/ME (July 11, 2006), Python 2.6 will stop
    supporting these platforms. Python development and
    maintainability becomes easier (and more reliable) when
    platform specific code targeting OSes with few users
    and no dedicated expert developers is taken out. The
    vendor also warns that the OS versions listed above
    "can expose customers to security risks" and recommends
    upgrade.
    
    Platform specific notes
    -----------------------
    
    
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    (Some of these may no longer apply.  If you find you can build Python
    
    on these platforms without the special directions mentioned here,
    submit a documentation bug report to SourceForge (see Bug Reports
    above) so we can remove them!)
    
    Unix platforms: If your vendor still ships (and you still use) Berkeley DB
    
            1.85 you will need to edit Modules/Setup to build the bsddb185
            module and add a line to sitecustomize.py which makes it the
            default.  In Modules/Setup a line like
    
            should work.  (You may need to add -I, -L or -l flags to direct the
            compiler and linker to your include files and libraries.)
    
    XXX I think this next bit is out of date:
    
    64-bit platforms: The modules audioop, imageop and rgbimg don't work.
    
            The setup.py script disables them on 64-bit installations.
            Don't try to enable them in the Modules/Setup file.  They
            contain code that is quite wordsize sensitive.  (If you have a
            fix, let us know!)
    
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    Solaris: When using Sun's C compiler with threads, at least on Solaris
    
            2.5.1, you need to add the "-mt" compiler option (the simplest
            way is probably to specify the compiler with this option as
            the "CC" environment variable when running the configure
            script).
    
            When using GCC on Solaris, beware of binutils 2.13 or GCC
            versions built using it.  This mistakenly enables the
            -zcombreloc option which creates broken shared libraries on
            Solaris.  binutils 2.12 works, and the binutils maintainers
    
            are aware of the problem.  Binutils 2.13.1 only partially
            fixed things.  It appears that 2.13.2 solves the problem
            completely.  This problem is known to occur with Solaris 2.7
            and 2.8, but may also affect earlier and later versions of the
            OS.
    
            When the dynamic loader complains about errors finding shared
            libraries, such as
    
            ld.so.1: ./python: fatal: libstdc++.so.5: open failed:
            No such file or directory
    
            you need to first make sure that the library is available on
            your system. Then, you need to instruct the dynamic loader how
            to find it. You can choose any of the following strategies:
    
            1. When compiling Python, set LD_RUN_PATH to the directories
               containing missing libraries.
            2. When running Python, set LD_LIBRARY_PATH to these directories.
            3. Use crle(8) to extend the search path of the loader.
            4. Modify the installed GCC specs file, adding -R options into the
               *link: section.
    
            The complex object fails to compile on Solaris 10 with gcc 3.4 (at
            least up to 3.4.3).  To work around it, define Py_HUGE_VAL as
            HUGE_VAL(), e.g.:
    
              make CPPFLAGS='-D"Py_HUGE_VAL=HUGE_VAL()" -I. -I$(srcdir)/Include'
    
              ./python setup.py CPPFLAGS='-D"Py_HUGE_VAL=HUGE_VAL()"'
    
    Linux:  A problem with threads and fork() was tracked down to a bug in
    
            the pthreads code in glibc version 2.0.5; glibc version 2.0.7
            solves the problem.  This causes the popen2 test to fail;
            problem and solution reported by Pablo Bleyer.
    
    Red Hat Linux: Red Hat 9 built Python2.2 in UCS-4 mode and hacked
    
            Tcl to support it. To compile Python2.3 with Tkinter, you will
            need to pass --enable-unicode=ucs4 flag to ./configure.
    
            There's an executable /usr/bin/python which is Python
            1.5.2 on most older Red Hat installations; several key Red Hat tools
            require this version.  Python 2.1.x may be installed as
            /usr/bin/python2.  The Makefile installs Python as
            /usr/local/bin/python, which may or may not take precedence
            over /usr/bin/python, depending on how you have set up $PATH.
    
    FreeBSD 3.x and probably platforms with NCurses that use libmytinfo or
    
            similar: When using cursesmodule, the linking is not done in
            the correct order with the defaults.  Remove "-ltermcap" from
            the readline entry in Setup, and use as curses entry: "curses
            cursesmodule.c -lmytinfo -lncurses -ltermcap" - "mytinfo" (so
            called on FreeBSD) should be the name of the auxiliary library
            required on your platform.  Normally, it would be linked
            automatically, but not necessarily in the correct order.
    
    BSDI:   BSDI versions before 4.1 have known problems with threads,
            which can cause strange errors in a number of modules (for
            instance, the 'test_signal' test script will hang forever.)
            Turning off threads (with --with-threads=no) or upgrading to
            BSDI 4.1 solves this problem.
    
    
    DEC Unix: Run configure with --with-dec-threads, or with
    
            --with-threads=no if no threads are desired (threads are on by
            default).  When using GCC, it is possible to get an internal
            compiler error if optimization is used.  This was reported for
            GCC 2.7.2.3 on selectmodule.c.  Manually compile the affected
            file without optimization to solve the problem.
    
    DEC Ultrix: compile with GCC to avoid bugs in the native compiler,
    
            and pass SHELL=/bin/sh5 to Make when installing.
    
    AIX:    A complete overhaul of the shared library support is now in
            place.  See Misc/AIX-NOTES for some notes on how it's done.
            (The optimizer bug reported at this place in previous releases
            has been worked around by a minimal code change.) If you get
            errors about pthread_* functions, during compile or during
            testing, try setting CC to a thread-safe (reentrant) compiler,
            like "cc_r".  For full C++ module support, set CC="xlC_r" (or
            CC="xlC" without thread support).
    
    AIX 5.3: To build a 64-bit version with IBM's compiler, I used the
            following:
    
            export PATH=/usr/bin:/usr/vacpp/bin
    
            ./configure --with-gcc="xlc_r -q64" --with-cxx="xlC_r -q64" \
    
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    HP-UX:  When using threading, you may have to add -D_REENTRANT to the
    
            OPT variable in the top-level Makefile; reported by Pat Knight,
            this seems to make a difference (at least for HP-UX 10.20)
            even though pyconfig.h defines it. This seems unnecessary when
            using HP/UX 11 and later - threading seems to work "out of the
            box".
    
    HP-UX ia64: When building on the ia64 (Itanium) platform using HP's
    
            compiler, some experience has shown that the compiler's
            optimiser produces a completely broken version of python
            (see http://www.python.org/sf/814976). To work around this,
            edit the Makefile and remove -O from the OPT line.
    
            To build a 64-bit executable on an Itanium 2 system using HP's
            compiler, use these environment variables:
    
                    CC=cc
                    CXX=aCC
                    BASECFLAGS="+DD64"
                    LDFLAGS="+DD64 -lxnet"
    
            then *unset* the environment variables again before running
            make.  (At least one of these flags causes the build to fail
            if it remains set.)  You still have to edit the Makefile and
            remove -O from the OPT line.
    
    HP PA-RISC 2.0: A recent bug report (http://www.python.org/sf/546117)
    
            suggests that the C compiler in this 64-bit system has bugs
            in the optimizer that break Python.  Compiling without
            optimization solves the problems.
    
    SCO:    The following apply to SCO 3 only; Python builds out of the box
            on SCO 5 (or so we've heard).
    
            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 is
            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:
    
    UnixWare: There are known bugs in the math library of the system, as well as
            problems in the handling of threads (calling fork in one
            thread may interrupt system calls in others). Therefore, test_math and
            tests involving threads will fail until those problems are fixed.
    
    
    QNX:    Chris Herborth (chrish@qnx.com) writes:
            configure works best if you use GNU bash; a port is available on
            ftp.qnx.com in /usr/free.  I used the following process to build,
            test and install Python 1.5.x under QNX:
    
            1) CONFIG_SHELL=/usr/local/bin/bash CC=cc RANLIB=: \
                ./configure --verbose --without-gcc --with-libm=""
    
            2) edit Modules/Setup to activate everything that makes sense for
               your system... tested here at QNX with the following modules:
    
                    array, audioop, binascii, cPickle, cStringIO, cmath,
                    crypt, curses, errno, fcntl, gdbm, grp, imageop,
                    _locale, math, md5, new, operator, parser, pcre,
                    posix, pwd, readline, regex, reop, rgbimg, rotor,
                    select, signal, socket, soundex, strop, struct,
                    syslog, termios, time, timing, zlib, audioop, imageop, rgbimg
    
               make SHELL=/usr/local/bin/bash OPT="-5 -Oil+nrt"
    
            4) make SHELL=/usr/local/bin/bash test
    
               Using GNU readline 2.2 seems to behave strangely, but I
               think that's a problem with my readline 2.2 port.  :-\
    
            5) make SHELL=/usr/local/bin/bash install
    
            If you get SIGSEGVs while running Python (I haven't yet, but
            I've only run small programs and the test cases), you're
            probably running out of stack; the default 32k could be a
            little tight.  To increase the stack size, edit the Makefile
            to read: LDFLAGS = -N 48k
    
    BeOS:   See Misc/BeOS-NOTES for notes about compiling/installing
            Python on BeOS R3 or later.  Note that only the PowerPC
            platform is supported for R3; both PowerPC and x86 are
            supported for R4.
    
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    Cray T3E: Mark Hadfield (m.hadfield@niwa.co.nz) writes:
    
            Python can be built satisfactorily on a Cray T3E but based on
            my experience with the NIWA T3E (2002-05-22, version 2.2.1)
            there are a few bugs and gotchas. For more information see a
            thread on comp.lang.python in May 2002 entitled "Building
            Python on Cray T3E".
    
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            1) Use Cray's cc and not gcc. The latter was reported not to
               work by Konrad Hinsen. It may work now, but it may not.
    
            2) To set sys.platform to something sensible, pass the
               following environment variable to the configure script:
    
                 MACHDEP=unicosmk
    
    
            2) Run configure with option "--enable-unicode=ucs4".
    
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            3) The Cray T3E does not support dynamic linking, so extension
               modules have to be built by adding (or uncommenting) lines
               in Modules/Setup. The minimum set of modules is
    
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               On NIWA's vanilla T3E system the following have also been
               included successfully:
    
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    	     _codecs, _locale, _socket, _symtable, _testcapi, _weakref
    	     array, binascii, cmath, cPickle, crypt, cStringIO, dbm
    
    	     errno, fcntl, grp, math, md5, operator, parser, pwd
    	     rotor, select, struct, strop, syslog, termios,
    	     time, timing
    
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            4) Once the python executable and library have been built, make
               will execute setup.py, which will attempt to build remaining
               extensions and link them dynamically. Each of these attempts
               will fail but should not halt the make process. This is
               normal.
    
            5) Running "make test" uses a lot of resources and causes
               problems on our system. You might want to try running tests
               singly or in small groups.
    
    SGI:    SGI's standard "make" utility (/bin/make or /usr/bin/make)
            does not check whether a command actually changed the file it
            is supposed to build.  This means that whenever you say "make"
            it will redo the link step.  The remedy is to use SGI's much
            smarter "smake" utility (/usr/sbin/smake), or GNU make.  If
            you set the first line of the Makefile to #!/usr/sbin/smake
            smake will be invoked by make (likewise for GNU make).
    
            WARNING: There are bugs in the optimizer of some versions of
            SGI's compilers that can cause bus errors or other strange
            behavior, especially on numerical operations.  To avoid this,
            try building with "make OPT=".
    
    OS/2:   If you are running Warp3 or Warp4 and have IBM's VisualAge C/C++
            compiler installed, just change into the pc\os2vacpp directory
            and type NMAKE.  Threading and sockets are supported by default
            in the resulting binaries of PYTHON15.DLL and PYTHON.EXE.
    
    
    Monterey (64-bit AIX): The current Monterey C compiler (Visual Age)
            uses the OBJECT_MODE={32|64} environment variable to set the
            compilation mode to either 32-bit or 64-bit (32-bit mode is
            the default).  Presumably you want 64-bit compilation mode for
            this 64-bit OS.  As a result you must first set OBJECT_MODE=64
            in your environment before configuring (./configure) or
            building (make) Python on Monterey.
    
    Reliant UNIX: The thread support does not compile on Reliant UNIX, and
            there is a (minor) problem in the configure script for that
            platform as well.  This should be resolved in time for a
            future release.
    
    MacOSX: The tests will crash on both 10.1 and 10.2 with SEGV in
    
            test_re and test_sre due to the small default stack size.  If
            you set the stack size to 2048 before doing a "make test" the
            failure can be avoided.  If you're using the tcsh (the default
            on OSX), or csh shells use "limit stacksize 2048" and for the
            bash shell, use "ulimit -s 2048".
    
            On naked Darwin you may want to add the configure option
    
            "--disable-toolbox-glue" to disable the glue code for the Carbon
    
            interface modules. The modules themselves are currently only built
            if you add the --enable-framework option, see below.
    
    
            On a clean OSX /usr/local does not exist. Do a
    
            "sudo mkdir -m 775 /usr/local"
    
            before you do a make install. It is probably not a good idea to
            do "sudo make install" which installs everything as superuser,
            as this may later cause problems when installing distutils-based
            additions.
    
            Some people have reported problems building Python after using "fink"
    
            to install additional unix software. Disabling fink (remove all 
            references to /sw from your .profile or .login) should solve this.
    
    
            You may want to try the configure option "--enable-framework"
            which installs Python as a framework. The location can be set
            as argument to the --enable-framework option (default
    
            /Library/Frameworks). A framework install is probably needed if you
            want to use any Aqua-based GUI toolkit (whether Tkinter, wxPython,
            Carbon, Cocoa or anything else).
    
    	You may also want to try the configure option "--enable-universalsdk"
    	which builds Python as a universal binary with support for the 
    	i386 and PPC architetures. This requires Xcode 2.1 or later to build.
    
            See Mac/OSX/README for more information on framework and 
    	universal builds.
    
    Cygwin: With recent (relative to the time of writing, 2001-12-19)
            Cygwin installations, there are problems with the interaction
            of dynamic linking and fork().  This manifests itself in build
            failures during the execution of setup.py.
    
            There are two workarounds that both enable Python (albeit
            without threading support) to build and pass all tests on
            NT/2000 (and most likely XP as well, though reports of testing
            on XP would be appreciated).
    
            The workarounds:
    
            (a) the band-aid fix is to link the _socket module statically
            rather than dynamically (which is the default).
    
            To do this, run "./configure --with-threads=no" including any
            other options you need (--prefix, etc.).  Then in Modules/Setup
    
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            uncomment the lines:
    
            #SSL=/usr/local/ssl
            #_socket socketmodule.c \
    
            #       -DUSE_SSL -I$(SSL)/include -I$(SSL)/include/openssl \
            #       -L$(SSL)/lib -lssl -lcrypto
    
            and remove "local/" from the SSL variable.  Finally, just run
            "make"!
    
    
            (b) The "proper" fix is to rebase the Cygwin DLLs to prevent
    
            base address conflicts.  Details on how to do this can be
            found in the following mail:
    
               http://sources.redhat.com/ml/cygwin/2001-12/msg00894.html
    
            It is hoped that a version of this solution will be
    
            incorporated into the Cygwin distribution fairly soon.
    
    
            Two additional problems:
    
            (1) Threading support should still be disabled due to a known
            bug in Cygwin pthreads that causes test_threadedtempfile to
            hang.
    
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            (2) The _curses module does not build.  This is a known
    
            Cygwin ncurses problem that should be resolved the next time
            that this package is released.
    
            On older versions of Cygwin, test_poll may hang and test_strftime
            may fail.
    
            The situation on 9X/Me is not accurately known at present.
            Some time ago, there were reports that the following
            regression tests failed:
    
            Due to the test_select hang on 9X/Me, one should run the
            regression test using the following:
    
            News regarding these platforms with more recent Cygwin
            versions would be appreciated!
    
    AtheOS: From Octavian Cerna <tavy at ylabs.com>:
    
    
                Make sure you have shared versions of the libraries you
                want to use with Python. You will have to compile them
                yourself, or download precompiled packages.
    
                $ ./configure --prefix=/usr/python
                $ make
    
                Python is always built as a shared library, otherwise
                dynamic loading would not work.
    
                # make install
                # pkgmanager -a /usr/python
    
                - large file support: due to a stdio bug in glibc/libio,
                  access to large files may not work correctly.  fseeko()
                  tries to seek to a negative offset.  ftello() returns a
                  negative offset, it looks like a 32->64bit
                  sign-extension issue.  The lowlevel functions (open,
                  lseek, etc) are OK.
                - sockets: AF_UNIX is defined in the C library and in
                  Python, but not implemented in the system.
                - select: poll is available in the C library, but does not
                  work (It does not return POLLNVAL for bad fds and
                  hangs).
                - posix: statvfs and fstatvfs always return ENOSYS.
                - disabled modules:
                    - mmap: not yet implemented in AtheOS
                    - nis: broken (on an unconfigured system
                      yp_get_default_domain() returns junk instead of
                      error)
                    - dl: dynamic loading doesn't work via dlopen()
                    - resource: getrimit and setrlimit are not yet
                      implemented
    
                - if you are getting segmentation faults, you probably are
                  low on memory.  AtheOS doesn't handle very well an
                  out-of-memory condition and simply SEGVs the process.
    
    Configuring the bsddb and dbm modules
    -------------------------------------
    
    
    Beginning with Python version 2.3, the PyBsddb package
    <http://pybsddb.sf.net/> was adopted into Python as the bsddb package,
    exposing a set of package-level functions which provide
    
    backwards-compatible behavior.  Only versions 3.3 through 4.4 of
    
    Sleepycat's libraries provide the necessary API, so older versions
    aren't supported through this interface.  The old bsddb module has
    been retained as bsddb185, though it is not built by default.  Users
    wishing to use it will have to tweak Modules/Setup to build it.  The
    dbm module will still be built against the Sleepycat libraries if
    
    other preferred alternatives (ndbm, gdbm) are not found.
    
    Building the sqlite3 module
    ---------------------------
    
    To build the sqlite3 module, you'll need the sqlite3 or libsqlite3
    packages installed, including the header files. Many modern operating
    systems distribute the headers in a separate package to the library -
    often it will be the same name as the main package, but with a -dev or
    -devel suffix. 
    
    The version of pysqlite2 that's including in Python needs sqlite3 3.0.8
    or later. setup.py attempts to check that it can find a correct version.
    
    Configuring threads
    -------------------
    
    
    As of Python 2.0, threads are enabled by default.  If you wish to
    compile without threads, or if your thread support is broken, pass the
    --with-threads=no switch to configure.  Unfortunately, on some
    platforms, additional compiler and/or linker options are required for
    threads to work properly.  Below is a table of those options,
    
    collected by Bill Janssen.  We would love to automate this process
    
    more, but the information below is not enough to write a patch for the
    configure.in file, so manual intervention is required.  If you patch
    the configure.in file and are confident that the patch works, please
    
    send in the patch.  (Don't bother patching the configure script itself
    
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    -- it is regenerated each time the configure.in file changes.)
    
    
    Compiler switches for threads
    .............................
    
    
    The definition of _REENTRANT should be configured automatically, if
    that does not work on your system, or if _REENTRANT is defined
    incorrectly, please report that as a bug.
    
    
        OS/Compiler/threads                     Switches for use with threads
    
        (POSIX is draft 10, DCE is draft 4)     compile & link
    
        SunOS 5.{1-5}/{gcc,SunPro cc}/solaris   -mt
        SunOS 5.5/{gcc,SunPro cc}/POSIX         (nothing)
    
    
    
    Linker (ld) libraries and flags for threads
    ...........................................
    
        OS/threads                          Libraries/switches for use with threads
    
        SunOS 5.{1-5}/solaris               -lthread
        SunOS 5.5/POSIX                     -lpthread
    
        DEC OSF/1 3.x/DCE                   -lpthreads -lmach -lc_r -lc
    
        Digital UNIX 4.x/DCE                -lpthreads -lpthread -lmach -lexc -lc
    
        Digital UNIX 4.x/POSIX              -lpthread -lmach -lexc -lc
    
    Building a shared libpython
    ---------------------------
    
    Starting with Python 2.3, the majority of the interpreter can be built
    
    into a shared library, which can then be used by the interpreter
    
    executable, and by applications embedding Python. To enable this feature,
    
    If you enable this feature, the same object files will be used to create
    a static library.  In particular, the static library will contain object
    files using position-independent code (PIC) on platforms where PIC flags
    are needed for the shared library.
    
    Configuring additional built-in modules
    
    ---------------------------------------
    
    Starting with Python 2.1, the setup.py script at the top of the source
    distribution attempts to detect which modules can be built and
    automatically compiles them.  Autodetection doesn't always work, so
    
    you can still customize the configuration by editing the Modules/Setup
    file; but this should be considered a last resort.  The rest of this
    section only applies if you decide to edit the Modules/Setup file.
    You also need this to enable static linking of certain modules (which
    is needed to enable profiling on some systems).
    
    
    This file is initially copied from Setup.dist by the configure script;
    if it does not exist yet, create it by copying Modules/Setup.dist
    yourself (configure will never overwrite it).  Never edit Setup.dist
    -- always edit Setup or Setup.local (see below).  Read the comments in
    the file for information on what kind of edits are allowed.  When you
    have edited Setup in the Modules directory, the interpreter will
    
    automatically be rebuilt the next time you run make (in the toplevel
    directory).
    
    
    Many useful modules can be built on any Unix system, but some optional
    modules can't be reliably autodetected.  Often the quickest way to
    determine whether a particular module works or not is to see if it
    will build: enable it in Setup, then if you get compilation or link
    
    errors, disable it -- you're either missing support or need to adjust
    the compilation and linking parameters for that module.
    
    
    On SGI IRIX, there are modules that interface to many SGI specific
    
    system libraries, e.g. the GL library and the audio hardware.  These
    modules will not be built by the setup.py script.
    
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    In addition to the file Setup, you can also edit the file Setup.local.
    (the makesetup script processes both).  You may find it more
    convenient to edit Setup.local and leave Setup alone.  Then, when
    installing a new Python version, you can copy your old Setup.local
    file.
    
    
    
    Setting the optimization/debugging options
    ------------------------------------------
    
    
    If you want or need 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).
    
    When compiling with GCC, the default value of OPT will also include
    the -Wall and -Wstrict-prototypes options.
    
    Additional debugging code to help debug memory management problems can
    be enabled by using the --with-pydebug option to the configure script.
    
    
    For flags that change binary compatibility, use the EXTRA_CFLAGS
    variable.
    
    
    Profiling
    ---------
    
    If you want C profiling turned on, the easiest way is to run configure
    with the CC environment variable to the necessary compiler
    invocation.  For example, on Linux, this works for profiling using
    gprof(1):
    
        CC="gcc -pg" ./configure
    
    Note that on Linux, gprof apparently does not work for shared
    libraries.  The Makefile/Setup mechanism can be used to compile and
    
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    link most extension modules statically.
    
    To test the interpreter, type "make test" in the top-level directory.
    
    This runs the test set twice (once with no compiled files, once with
    the compiled files left by the previous test run).  The test set
    produces some output.  You can generally ignore the messages about
    
    skipped tests due to optional features which can't be imported.
    
    If a message is printed about a failed test or a traceback or core
    dump is produced, something is wrong.  On some Linux systems (those
    
    that are not yet using glibc 6), test_strftime fails due to a
    
    non-standard implementation of strftime() in the C library. Please
    ignore this, or upgrade to glibc version 6.
    
    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
    
            ./python ./Lib/test/test_whatever.py
    
    (substituting the top of the source tree for '.' if you built in a
    
    different directory).  This runs the test in verbose mode.
    
    To install the Python binary, library modules, shared library modules
    (see below), include files, configuration files, and the manual page,
    
    This will install all platform-independent files in subdirectories of
    the directory given with the --prefix option to configure or to the
    `prefix' Make variable (default /usr/local).  All binary and other
    platform-specific files will be installed in subdirectories if the
    directory given by --exec-prefix or the `exec_prefix' Make variable
    (defaults to the --prefix directory) is given.
    
    If DESTDIR is set, it will be taken as the root directory of the
    installation, and files will be installed into $(DESTDIR)$(prefix),
    $(DESTDIR)$(exec_prefix), etc.
    
    
    All subdirectories created will have Python's version number in their
    name, e.g. the library modules are installed in
    
    "/usr/local/lib/python<version>/" by default, where <version> is the
    <major>.<minor> release number (e.g. "2.1").  The Python binary is
    installed as "python<version>" and a hard link named "python" is
    created.  The only file not installed with a version number in its
    name is the manual page, installed as "/usr/local/man/man1/python.1"
    by default.
    
    If you have a previous installation of Python that you don't
    
    want to replace yet, use
    
    
    
    This installs the same set of files as "make install" except it
    
    doesn't create the hard link to "python<version>" named "python" and
    it doesn't install the manual page at all.
    
    
    The only thing you may have to install manually is the Python mode for
    
    Emacs found in Misc/python-mode.el.  (But then again, more recent
    versions of Emacs may already have it.)  Follow the instructions that
    came with Emacs for installation of site-specific files.
    
    On Mac OS X, if you have configured Python with --enable-framework, you
    should use "make frameworkinstall" to do the installation. Note that this
    installs the Python executable in a place that is not normally on your
    PATH, you may want to set up a symlink in /usr/local/bin.
    
    
    Configuration options and variables
    -----------------------------------
    
    Some special cases are handled by passing options to the configure
    script.
    
    WARNING: if you rerun the configure script with different options, you
    must run "make clean" before rebuilding.  Exceptions to this rule:
    after changing --prefix or --exec-prefix, all you need to do is remove
    
    
    --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.