autoinstall 0.2

package loader for auto installing Python packages.

A package loader in the spirit of Zero Install that can be used to
inject dependencies into the import process.


To install::

easy_install -U autoinstall

or

download, unpack, python setup.py install

or

try the bootstrap loader. See below.


To use::

# You can bind any package name to a URL pointing to something
# that can be imported using the zipimporter.

autoinstall.bind("pymarc", "http://pypi.python.org/packages/2.5/p/pymarc/pymarc-2.1-py2.5.egg")

import pymarc

print pymarc.__version__, pymarc.__file__


Changelog::

- added support for non top level packages.
- cache files now use filename part from URL.
- applied patch from Eric Seidel <eseidel@google.com> to add support
for loading modules where the module is not at the root of the .zip
file.


TODO::

- a description of the intended use case
- address other issues pointed out in:

http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2008-March/077926.html

Scribbles::

pull vs. push
user vs. system
web vs. filesystem
auto vs. manual

manage development sandboxes

optional interfaces...

def get_data(pathname) -> string with file data.

Return the data associated with 'pathname'. Raise IOError if
the file wasn't found.");

def is_package,
"is_package(fullname) -> bool.

Return True if the module specified by fullname is a package.
Raise ZipImportError is the module couldn't be found.");

def get_code,
"get_code(fullname) -> code object.

Return the code object for the specified module. Raise ZipImportError
is the module couldn't be found.");

def get_source,
"get_source(fullname) -> source string.

Return the source code for the specified module. Raise ZipImportError
is the module couldn't be found, return None if the archive does
contain the module, but has no source for it.");


Autoinstall can also be bootstraped with the nascent package loader
bootstrap module. For example::

# or via the bootstrap
# loader.

try:
_version = "0.2"
import autoinstall
if autoinstall.__version__ != _version:
raise ImportError("A different version than expected found.")
except ImportError, e:
# http://svn.python.org/projects/sandbox/trunk/bootstrap/bootstrap.py
import bootstrap
pypi = "http://pypi.python.org"
dir = "packages/source/a/autoinstall"
url = "%s/%s/autoinstall-%s.tar.gz" % (pypi, dir, _version)
bootstrap.main((url,))
import autoinstall

References::

http://0install.net/
http://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0302/
http://svn.python.org/projects/sandbox/trunk/import_in_py
http://0install.net/injector-find.html
http://roscidus.com/desktop/node/903