Merge pull request #343 from buildout/history

Motivation, history and Python packaging topic

doc/getting-started.rst

@@ -743,11 +743,11 @@ details, as well as let you know about features not touched on here.
 
 .. [#egg] You may have heard bad things about eggs.  This stems in
    part from the way that eggs were applied to regular Python
-   installs.  We think eggs, which were inspired by `jar
+   installs.  We think eggs, which were inspired by `jar files
    <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JAR_(file_format)>`_, when used as
    an installation format, are a good fit for Buildout's goals.  Learn
-   more in the topic on :doc:`Buildout and packaging
-   <topics/buildout-and-packaging>`.
+   more in the topic on :ref:`Buildout and packaging
+   <buildout_and_packaging>`.
 
 .. [#configparser] Buildout uses a variation (fork) of standard
    ``ConfigParser`` module and follows (mostly) the same parsing

doc/topics/history.rst

+=========================================
+History, motivation, and Python packaging
+=========================================
+
+Isolation from environment
+==========================
+
+In the early 2000s, Zope Corporation was helping customers build
+Zope-based applications.  A major difficulty was helping people deploy
+the applications in their own environments, which varied not just
+between customers, but also between customer machines. The customer
+environments, including operating system versions, libraries and
+Python modules installed were not well defined and subject to change
+over time.
+
+We realized that we needed to insulate ourselves from the customer
+environments [#ultimately-not-enough]_ to have any chance of
+predictable success.
+
+We decided to provide our own Python builds into which we
+installed the application.  These were automated with `make
+<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Make_(software)>`_.  Customers would
+receive `tar <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tar_(computing)>`_ files,
+expand them and run ``make``.  We referred to these as "build outs".
+
+Python
+======
+
+Later, as the applications we were building became more complex, some
+of us wanted to be able to use Python, rather than make, to automate
+deployments.  In 2005, we created an internal prototype that used
+builds defined using `ConfigParser-formatted configuration files
+<https://docs.python.org/2/library/configparser.html>`_.  File
+sections described things to be built and there were a few built-in
+build recipes and eventually facilities for implementing custom
+recipes.
+
+By this time, we were hosting most of the applications we were
+building, but we were still building Python and critical libraries
+ourselves as part of deployment, to isolate ourselves from system
+Python and library packages.
+
+After several months of successful experience with the prototype, we
+decided to build what became zc.buildout based on our experience,
+making a recipe framework a main idea.
+
+.. _buildout_and_packaging:
+
+Buildout and packaging
+======================
+
+Around this time, `setuptools and easy_install
+<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Setuptools>`_ were released, providing
+automated download and installation of Python packages *and their
+dependencies*.  Because we built large applications, this was
+something we'd wanted for some time and had even begun building a
+package manager ourselves.  Part of the rationale for creating a new
+Buildout version, beyond the initial prototype, was to take advantage of
+the additional automation that setuptools promised.
+
+Initially, we tried to leverage the ``easy_install`` command
+[#easy_install_module]_, but the goals of ``easy_install`` and
+Buildout were at odds.  ``easy_install`` sought to make it easy for
+humans to install and upgrade packages manually, in an ad hoc manner.
+While it installed dependencies, it didn't upgrade them.  It didn't
+provide ways of managing an installation as a whole.  Buildout, on the
+other hand, was all about automation and repeatability.
+
+To achieve Buildout's goals, it was necessary to interact with
+setuptools at a much lower level and to write quite a bit of packaging
+logic than planned.
+
+Eggs
+----
+
+Setuptools defined a packaging format, `eggs
+<http://peak.telecommunity.com/DevCenter/PythonEggs>`_, used for
+package distribution and installation.  Their design was based on Java
+`jar files <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JAR_(file_format)>`_, which
+bundle software together with supporting resources, including
+meta-data.
+
+Eggs presented a number of challenges, and have a bad reputation as a
+result:
+
+- As an installation format:
+
+  - They needed to be added to the Python path. The ``easy_install``
+    command did this by generating complex `.pth files
+    <https://docs.python.org/2/library/site.html>`_.  This often
+    lead to hard to diagnose bugs and frustration.
+
+  - By default, eggs were installed as `zip files
+    <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zip_(file_format)>`_.  Software
+    development tools used by most Python developers
+    [#java-loves-zip]_ made working with zip files difficult.  Also,
+    importing from zip files was much slower on Unix-like systems.
+
+- As a distribution format, eggs names carry insufficient meta data
+  to distinguish incompatible builds of extensions on Linux.
+
+-----------------------------------
+Buildout uses eggs very differently
+-----------------------------------
+
+.. sidebar:: Script generation
+
+   When Buildout generates a script, it's usually generating a wrapper
+   script.  Python package distributions define scripts in two ways,
+   via `entry points
+   <https://setuptools.readthedocs.io/en/latest/setuptools.html#automatic-script-creation>`_,
+   or as `scripts
+   <https://docs.python.org/2/distutils/setupscript.html#installing-scripts>`_
+   in a separate ``scripts`` area of the distribution.
+
+   Entry points are meta data that define a main function to be run
+   when a user invokes a generated script. Entry points make it easier
+   to control how a script is run, including what version of Python is
+   used and the Python path.  Initially, Buildout only supported
+   installing entry-point-based scripts.
+
+   The older way of packaging scripts is harder to deal with, because
+   Buildout has to edit scripts to use the correct Python installation
+   and to set the Python path.
+
+Buildout doesn't use ``.pth`` files. Instead, when Buildout generates
+a script, it generates a Python path that names the eggs needed, and
+only the eggs needed, for a particular script based on its
+requirements.  When Buildout is run, scripts are regenerated if
+versions of any of their dependencies change.  Scripts defined by
+different parts can use different versions, because they have
+different Python paths. Changing a version used often requires only
+updating the path generated for a script.
+
+Buildout's approach to assembling applications should be familiar to
+anyone who's worked with Java applications, which are assembled the
+same way, using jars and class paths.
+
+Buildout uses eggs almost exclusively as an **installation** format
+[#unzipped]_, in a way that leverages eggs' strengths.  Eggs provide
+Buildout with the ability to efficiently control which dependencies a
+script uses, providing repeatability and predictability.
+
+.. [#ultimately-not-enough] Ultimately, we moved to a model where we
+   hosted software ourselves for customers, because we needed control
+   over operation, as well as installation and upgrades, and because
+   with the technology of the time, we still weren't able to
+   sufficiently insulate ourselves from the customers' environments.
+
+.. [#easy_install_module] The ``zc.buildout.easy_install`` module
+   started out as a thin wrapper around the ``easy_install``
+   command. Although it has (almost) nothing to do with the
+   ``easy_install`` command today, its name has remained, because it
+   provides some public APIs.
+
+.. [#java-loves-zip] Java tools have no problem working with zip
+   files, because of the prominence of jar files, which like eggs, use
+   zip format.
+
+.. [#unzipped] Buildout always unzips eggs into ordinary directories,
+   by default.

doc/topics/index.rst

@@ -5,9 +5,10 @@ Buildout Topics
 .. toctree::
    :maxdepth: 2
 
+   history
+
 .. todo:
 
    variables-extending-and-substitutions
    writing-recipes
    bootstrapping
-   buildout-and-packaging