errors encountered while installing Python -- please advise

[Ryan Schmidt]

On Sep 19, 2008, at 5:03 PM, Bryan Blackburn wrote:

> On Fri, Sep 19, 2008 at 05:34:59PM -0400, Richard Rucker said:
>
>> On Sep 19, 2008, at 4:36 PM, Bryan Blackburn wrote:
>>
>>> Any particular reason why you're using py-serial instead of py25-
>>> serial?
>>> py-* ports are usually python 2.4 (some may be 2.3, not sure).
>>
>> I'm just following the instructions given for installing D-Rats on a
>> Mac. Here's a copy:
>>
>> -----------------------------
>> Go to http://www.macports.org/install.php and follow the directions
>> there
>> Once macports is installed, you can open a terminal and install the
>> dependencies:
>>
>> % sudo port install py25-gtk py-serial py25-xml py25-hashlib
>>
>> This will take a long time.
>> When it's done, you'll need to link the pyserial package into the
>> python2.5 library:
>>
>> % sudo ln -s /opt/local/lib/python2.4/site-packages/serial /opt/ 
>> local/
>> lib/python2.5/site-packages/serial
>>
>> After that, you should be able to download the latest source release,
>> untar it, and run:
>>
>> % /opt/local/bin/python2.5 d-rats.py
>> -------------------------------
>>
>> I'm a novice at this command line stuff. So what's the difference
>> between py-serial and py25-serial?  And what do they do?
>
> If you use py25-serial instead, then that 'sudo ln -s ...' above  
> would not
> be needed (and in theory, could be a bad idea though sounds like it  
> works
> for the serial module).
>
> Both py-serial and py25-serial install the serial module, but the  
> former
> installs it with python 2.4 (hence the python2.4 in that path  
> above), and
> the latter for python 2.5.  Since all of the other modules listed  
> are for
> 2.5, using py25-serial should be much simpler as then you won't  
> have to
> build/install both 2.4 and 2.5 of python.  Especially if you'll  
> just be
> linking the one module from 2.4 into 2.5.

Right.

Richard, could you please submit feedback to the authors of the  
document you read, telling them to update their instructions to use  
py25-serial instead of py-serial? You can refer them back to Bryan's  
message with this URL if necessary:

http://lists.macosforge.org/pipermail/macports-users/2008-September/ 
011555.html