New batch of patches by Jeff Rush; moved his readme.txt portion here.

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+IBM VisualAge C/C++ for OS/2

+============================

+

+To build Python for OS/2, change into ./os2vacpp and issue an 'NMAKE'

+command.  This will build a PYTHON15.DLL containing the set of Python

+modules listed in config.c and a small PYTHON.EXE to start the

+interpreter.

+

+By changing the C compiler flag /Gd- in the makefile to /Gd+, you can

+reduce the size of these by causing Python to dynamically link to the

+C runtime DLLs instead of including their bulk in your binaries. 

+However, this means that any system on which you run Python must have

+the VAC++ compiler installed in order to have those DLLs available.

+

+During the build process you may see a couple of harmless warnings:

+

+  From the C Compiler, "No function prototype given for XXX", which

+  comes from the use of K&R parameters within Python for portability.

+

+  From the ILIB librarian, "Module Not Found (XXX)", which comes

+  from its attempt to perform the (-+) operation, which removes and

+  then adds a .OBJ to the library.  The first time a build is done,

+  it obviously cannot remove what is not yet built.

+

+This build includes support for most Python functionality as well as

+TCP/IP sockets.  It omits the Posix ability to 'fork' a process but

+supports threads using OS/2 native capabilities.  I have tried to

+support everything possible but here are a few usage notes.

+

+

+-- os.popen() Usage Warnings

+

+With respect to my implementation of popen() under OS/2:

+

+    import os

+

+    fd = os.popen("pkzip.exe -@ junk.zip", 'wb')

+    fd.write("file1.txt\n")

+    fd.write("file2.txt\n")

+    fd.write("file3.txt\n")

+    fd.write("\x1a")  # Should Not Be Necessary But Is

+    fd.close()

+

+There is a bug, either in the VAC++ compiler or OS/2 itself, where the

+simple closure of the write-side of a pipe -to- a process does not

+send an EOF to that process.  I find I must explicitly write a

+control-Z (EOF) before closing the pipe.  This is not a problem when

+using popen() in read mode.

+

+One other slight difference with my popen() is that I return None

+from the close(), instead of the Unix convention of the return code

+of the spawned program.  I could find no easy way to do this under

+OS/2.

+

+

+-- BEGINLIBPATH/ENDLIBPATH

+

+With respect to environment variables, this OS/2 port supports the

+special-to-OS/2 magic names of 'BEGINLIBPATH' and 'ENDLIBPATH' to

+control where to load conventional DLLs from.  Those names are

+intercepted and converted to calls on the OS/2 kernel APIs and

+are inherited by child processes, whether Python-based or not.

+

+A few new attributes have been added to the os module:

+

+    os.meminstalled  # Count of Bytes of RAM Installed on Machine

+    os.memkernel     # Count of Bytes of RAM Reserved (Non-Swappable)

+    os.memvirtual    # Count of Bytes of Virtual RAM Possible

+    os.timeslice     # Duration of Scheduler Timeslice, in Milliseconds

+    os.maxpathlen    # Maximum Length of a Path Specification, in chars

+    os.maxnamelen    # Maximum Length of a Single Dir/File Name, in chars

+    os.version       # Version of OS/2 Being Run e.g. "4.00"

+    os.revision      # Revision of OS/2 Being Run (usually zero)

+    os.bootdrive     # Drive that System Booted From e.g. "C:"

+                     # (useful to find the CONFIG.SYS used to boot with)

+

+

+-- Using Python as the Default OS/2 Batch Language

+

+Note that OS/2 supports the Unix technique of putting the special

+comment line at the time of scripts e.g. "#!/usr/bin/python" in

+a different syntactic form.  To do this, put your script into a file

+with a .CMD extension and added 'extproc' to the top as follows:

+

+    extproc C:\Python\Python.exe -x

+    import os

+    print "Hello from Python"

+

+The '-x' option tells Python to skip the first line of the file

+while processing the rest as normal Python source.

+

+

+-- Suggested Environment Variable Setup

+

+With respect to the environment variables for Python, I use the

+following setup:

+

+    Set PYTHONHOME=E:\Tau\Projects\Python;D:\DLLs

+    Set PYTHONPATH=.;E:\Tau\Projects\Python\Lib; \

+                     E:\Tau\Projects\Python\Lib\plat-win

+

+The EXEC_PREFIX (optional second pathspec on PYTHONHOME) is where

+you put any Python extension DLLs you may create/obtain.  There

+are none provided with this release.

+

+

+-- Contact Info

+

+If you have questions, suggestions or problems specifically with

+the OS/2 VAC++ port of Python, please contact me at:

+

+    Jeff Rush <jrush@summit-research.com>.

+

+I support no other platform but OS/2 (and eventually AmigaDOS).