Suggest updated text for download page.

wxPython Dev
1

Hi folks (mostly Robin...),

Apparently there is confusion about the state of wxPython on the Mac, particularly with the introduction of Snow Leopard. It looks like the download page is a bit out of date. I suggest the following changes:

···

At the top of the download page, under OS-X, it now says:

Mac OS X

     * wxPython needs a special Mac OS X-specific build of Python, called a Framework build, in order to work. Panther and Tiger include a Framework build of Python 2.3, or you can get a newer version of Python the Python Framework from the Python site.

I suggest:

* wxPython needs a special Mac OS X-specific build of Python, called a Framework build, in order to work. The easiest option is to use the build provided by python.org, which will work with OS-X 10.3.9 and above. wxPython will also work with the Framework builds provided by Apple in 10.4 (python2.3) and 10.5 (python 2.5). wxPython is on the Mac is 32 bit only. The python apples supplies with 10.6 (Snow Leopard) is 64 bit and will not work with wxPython. A 64 bit Cocoa-based wxPython is in the works, but not yet production ready.

Under Binaries, it currently says:

The Max OSX version of wxPython is distributed as a set of mountable disk images. The runtime versions contain Installer packages, as well as a script that can perform an uninstall of previous installs of wxPython. (NOTE: If you have versions prior to 2.5.3.1 installed please do run the uninstaller to remove the older version.)

Not sure if you should use the ANSI or Unicode version? Read here for more info.

Got an Intel Mac? All of the wxPython builds for OS X are now Universal Binaries, and will work on OS X 10.3.9 or 10.4.x, PPC or Intel.

I suggest:

The Max OSX version of wxPython is distributed as a set of mountable disk images. The runtime versions contain Installer packages, as well as a script that can perform an uninstall of previous installs of wxPython.

All of the wxPython builds for OS X are Universal Binaries, and will work on OS X 10.3.9 or 10.4.x, PPC or Intel. We recommend using them with the with the python binaries from python.org. They will also work with the python 2.3 provided by apple with OS-X 10.4 (Tiger), or the python2.5 provided by Apple on OS-X 10.5 (Leopard). They will not work with the python supplied my Apple on 10.6 (Snow leopard).

NOTE: I only suggest this wording if it is correct, of course!

-Chris

--
Christopher Barker, Ph.D.
Oceanographer

Emergency Response Division
NOAA/NOS/OR&R (206) 526-6959 voice
7600 Sand Point Way NE (206) 526-6329 fax
Seattle, WA 98115 (206) 526-6317 main reception

Chris.Barker@noaa.gov

2

Apple does ship 32 bit python in Snow Leopard, it's just not the
default and you need to jump through some hoops to enable it.

You can switch to 32 bit default just by running:
defaults write com.apple.versioner.python Prefer-32-Bit -bool

If you want to do it on a temporary basis, set the environment
variable VERSIONER_PYTHON_PREFER_32_BIT

as in:
export VERSIONER_PYTHON_PREFER_32_BIT=yes

You can also run a 32 bit Python 2.6 manually by using the "arch" command:

arch -i386 python2.6

(note that just using "python" won't work, as thats a front end to the
versioner - so it wil run a 32 bit version of the versioning script,
which will then happily choose 64 bit python).
"man python" has all the details.

I don't think we'd need to stick all this information on the man page,
maybe just a pointer to man python.

···

On Sat, Mar 6, 2010 at 1:22 PM, Christopher Barker <Chris.Barker@noaa.gov> wrote:

Hi folks (mostly Robin...),

Apparently there is confusion about the state of wxPython on the Mac,
particularly with the introduction of Snow Leopard. It looks like the
download page is a bit out of date. I suggest the following changes:

At the top of the download page, under OS-X, it now says:

Mac OS X

* wxPython needs a special Mac OS X-specific build of Python, called a
Framework build, in order to work. Panther and Tiger include a Framework
build of Python 2.3, or you can get a newer version of Python the Python
Framework from the Python site.

I suggest:

* wxPython needs a special Mac OS X-specific build of Python, called a
Framework build, in order to work. The easiest option is to use the build
provided by python.org, which will work with OS-X 10.3.9 and above. wxPython
will also work with the Framework builds provided by Apple in 10.4
(python2.3) and 10.5 (python 2.5). wxPython is on the Mac is 32 bit only.
The python apples supplies with 10.6 (Snow Leopard) is 64 bit and will not
work with wxPython. A 64 bit Cocoa-based wxPython is in the works, but not
yet production ready.

Under Binaries, it currently says:

The Max OSX version of wxPython is distributed as a set of mountable disk
images. The runtime versions contain Installer packages, as well as a script
that can perform an uninstall of previous installs of wxPython. (NOTE: If
you have versions prior to 2.5.3.1 installed please do run the uninstaller
to remove the older version.)

Not sure if you should use the ANSI or Unicode version? Read here for more
info.

Got an Intel Mac? All of the wxPython builds for OS X are now Universal
Binaries, and will work on OS X 10.3.9 or 10.4.x, PPC or Intel.

I suggest:

The Max OSX version of wxPython is distributed as a set of mountable disk
images. The runtime versions contain Installer packages, as well as a script
that can perform an uninstall of previous installs of wxPython.

All of the wxPython builds for OS X are Universal Binaries, and will work on
OS X 10.3.9 or 10.4.x, PPC or Intel. We recommend using them with the with
the python binaries from python.org. They will also work with the python 2.3
provided by apple with OS-X 10.4 (Tiger), or the python2.5 provided by Apple
on OS-X 10.5 (Leopard). They will not work with the python supplied my Apple
on 10.6 (Snow leopard).

3

Hi folks (mostly Robin...),

Apparently there is confusion about the state of wxPython on the Mac, particularly with the introduction of Snow Leopard. It looks like the download page is a bit out of date. I suggest the following changes:

Mac OS X

    * wxPython needs a special Mac OS X-specific build of Python, called a Framework build, in order to work. Panther and Tiger include a Framework build of Python 2.3, or you can get a newer version of Python the Python Framework from the Python site.

I suggest:

* wxPython needs a special Mac OS X-specific build of Python, called a Framework build, in order to work. The easiest option is to use the build provided by python.org, which will work with OS-X 10.3.9 and above. wxPython will also work with the Framework builds provided by Apple in 10.4 (python2.3) and 10.5 (python 2.5). wxPython is on the Mac is 32 bit only. The python apples supplies with 10.6 (Snow Leopard) is 64 bit and will not work with wxPython. A 64 bit Cocoa-based wxPython is in the works, but not yet production ready.

I initially intended just to offer the following amendment to the last part of this suggestion:

wxPython for the Mac is 32 bit only, but the Apple-supplied Python in 10.6 (Snow Leopard) is 64 bit Python 2.6 by default - although consult Apple Python's "man python" to change this - so wxPython will not work with it. A 64 bit wxPython for the Mac is in the works, but not yet production ready.

But I then started looking at the various Pythons and wxPythons I'd got in my own Snow Leopard installation - created by upgrading from Leopard - and got hopelessly confused. So I did a clean install of Snow Leopard on a spare partition and discovered:

macleo:~ Admin$ python
Python 2.6.1 (r261:67515, Jul 7 2009, 23:51:51)
[GCC 4.2.1 (Apple Inc. build 5646)] on darwin
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> import platform
>>> platform.platform()
'Darwin-10.0.0-i386-64bit'
>>> import sys
>>> sys.path
['', '/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.6/lib/python26.zip', '/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.6/lib/python2.6', ........... '/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.6/Extras/lib/python/PyObjC', '/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.6/Extras/lib/python/wx-2.8-mac-unicode']
>>> import wx
>>> wx.version()
'2.8.8.1 (mac-unicode)'

So it looks as if wxPython 2.8.8.1 is pre-installed with the 64 bit Apple Python 2.6. I found a copy of the (2.8.9.1) demo and, after warning about the wrong version, it seemed to work OK. Is this a special 64 bit build of 2.8.8.1? I haven't checked what happens if you try to upgrade it with a later binary from wxpython.org

Regards,

David Hughes
Forestfield Software

···

On 06/03/2010 19:22, Christopher Barker wrote:

At the top of the download page, under OS-X, it now says:

4

First a note:

I'm not currently running Snow Leopard, but what I can tell from the messages I see on the PythonMac and other lists, it's a bit of a mess -- so I suggest that we keep it simple and suggest that newbies simply use the python.org python.

That being said:

David Hughes wrote:

I initially intended just to offer the following amendment to the last part of this suggestion:

wxPython for the Mac is 32 bit only, but the Apple-supplied Python in 10.6 (Snow Leopard) is 64 bit Python 2.6 by default - although consult Apple Python's "man python" to change this - so wxPython will not work with it. A 64 bit wxPython for the Mac is in the works, but not yet production ready.

seems reasonable, but maybe still a bit too complicated...

I did a clean install of Snow Leopard on a spare partition and discovered:

macleo:~ Admin$ python
>>> platform.platform()
'Darwin-10.0.0-i386-64bit'

interesting -- I wonder what you get it here if you start up the 32 bit version... have you checked sys.maxint?

In [7]: sys.maxint
Out[7]: 2147483647
(on my 32 bit build)

>>> import sys
>>> sys.path
'/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.6/Extras/lib/python/wx-2.8-mac-unicode']

well, since they have 32 and 64 bits side-by side, it could work with the 32 bit side...

>>> import wx
>>> wx.version()
'2.8.8.1 (mac-unicode)'

but will it run? wxPython doesn't do much on import. Try:

A = wx.app()

and see what happens -- or, better yet, run a real app.

I found a copy of the (2.8.9.1) demo and, after warning about the wrong version, it seemed to work OK.

are you sure you ran in 64 bit mode?

Is this a special 64 bit build of 2.8.8.1?

No, it's really not possible -- wxPython 2.8 is built on Carbon, and Carbon is 32 bit.

But all this does is point out even more how confusing this is -- we really need to define a straightforward path that will work for newbies and make that path obvious.

-Chris

···

--
Christopher Barker, Ph.D.
Oceanographer

Emergency Response Division
NOAA/NOS/OR&R (206) 526-6959 voice
7600 Sand Point Way NE (206) 526-6329 fax
Seattle, WA 98115 (206) 526-6317 main reception

Chris.Barker@noaa.gov