[Python-Dev] Visual studio 2005 express now free

Mon Apr 24 16:53:09 CEST 2006

On Apr 24, 2006, at 12:19 AM, Martin v. Löwis wrote:
> Martin v. Löwis wrote:
>> - Paul Moore has contributed a Python build procedure for the
>> free version of the 2003 compiler. This one is without IDE,
>> but still, it should allow people without a VS 2003 license
>> to work on Python itself; it should also be possible to develop
>> extensions with that compiler (although I haven't verified
>> that distutils would pick that up correctly).
>> Apparently, the status of this changed right now: it seems that
> the 2003 compiler is not available anymore; the page now says
> that it was replaced with the 2005 compiler.
>> Should we reconsider?

Personally, being a cheapskate, and with Windows only my tertiary 
system, I'm in favor of anything that makes it simpler and/or cheaper 
for people to work on Python and extensions. However, by the same 
token I cannot really gauge how stable and solid VS 2005 is -- if as 
current Windows experts you think it's still inferior to VS 2003, 
then that's a very big point against it.
Alex