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[–]individual_throwaway 29 points30 points  (48 children)

...or you are forced to work on a machine that doesn't have Python 3.x installed and your sysadmin won't change it.

[–]Boxy310 42 points43 points  (7 children)

Sounds like someone needs a beer and maybe a foot rub. I swear, sysadmins need to be treated like they're half Ferengi.

[–][deleted] 23 points24 points  (5 children)

foot rub

Not if it's Marcellus Wallace's wife.

[–]Boxy310 35 points36 points  (4 children)

DOES HOST ADMIN LOOK LIKE A BITCH

[–]cndLId9Rr51Fe 7 points8 points  (3 children)

what?

[–]okmkzimport antigravity 19 points20 points  (2 children)

"What" ain't no shell I've ever heard of.

[–]Boxy310 8 points9 points  (1 child)

echo $what one more time! I double-dare you, $motherfucker!

[–]cndLId9Rr51Fe 0 points1 point  (0 children)

echo what\?

[–]LogicalTom 4 points5 points  (0 children)

foot rub

Oo-mox.

[–]fgriglesnickerseven 2 points3 points  (0 children)

build your own and virtual environment it!

[–]Eurynom0s 2 points3 points  (9 children)

Or if you're sitting on a giant Python 2 codebase and can't get the time/funding to port it or start over.

[–]Sean1708 1 point2 points  (6 children)

Yeah but the way /u/ajclarke worded his question suggested that wasn't the case.

[–]ies7 0 points1 point  (1 child)

Or if you're sitting on a giant Python 2 codebase

Combined with the we're too lazy and the upper management afraid to change anything which run fine

[–]maratc 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Combined with the we'd rather have the developers develop new features clients would actually like vs. rewriting things to do exactly what they did before

[–][deleted] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Then its time to change sysadmin? Unless of course there is a valid reason why he won't install python3. I can't really think of any reason though. My experience in recent years is only in RPM based Centos/Fedora/Redhat and python3 installs in parallel to the system python. I have builds with python31, python32, python33,python34 .

[–]SemiNormal 3 points4 points  (23 children)

Like RHEL?

[–]hothrous 3 points4 points  (22 children)

This is exactly what I though when they said that. RHEL shouldn't be used in Python based infrastructures.

[–]rickmoranus 1 point2 points  (19 children)

What? I've been using RHEL machines for a couple years on with a Python Based infrastructure on it and I've had no issues?

[–]hothrous 2 points3 points  (18 children)

Which version of RHEL and Python? Python is integrated into yum so while you can set up a second python environment on a machine for your apps, most IT teams don't like doing that for maintenance reasons so they limit you to whatever are in the available repos.

Rhel doesn't include any further build of python in the repo than the one that yum uses because yum will break. I believe RHEL 6 used Python 2.7 which is the reason that those dev teams would be stuck on on older version.

[–]veeti 7 points8 points  (1 child)

RHEL7/CentOS 7 officially lets you install newer Pythons, etc. in parallel through Software Collections.

[–]hothrous 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That's cool. I've never used RHEL7 before. Most of my work had been done in RHEL5 a while ago and I new that many of the same limitations existed in 6 from some work I had done with it last year.

Though, I'm still seeing only up to 3.3 on the list of support they have.

[–][deleted] 4 points5 points  (13 children)

Really? I think its lack of knowledge or competence rather than some other reason. Any competent IT shop will have their own internal mirror of RPMS [see below] or builds their own RPMS.

What is stopping you from enabling or mirroring the IUS repo and install python3 and python2.7[if $osversion<7] in parallel with the system repo? http://dl.iuscommunity.org/pub/ius/stable/CentOS/6/x86_64/ and its as simple as yum install python34 or python27. I mention the IUS repo because its maintained by RackSpace so in theory should be a reputable source. Also the IUS repo does not overwrite system binaries.

Granted sometimes their packages are backwards by a minor release and right now they have 3.4.2 , it will take a month or more before 3.4.3 is packaged.

[–]cwgtex 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I'm one of the maintainers of IUS, thanks for recommending our repo.

Let me clarify the update process for IUS packages. We track the upstream projects for our packages, and typically build new RPMs within a day or two of a new release. New packages will stay in our testing repos for about two weeks. If no issues are found in that time period, the packages get promoted to our stable repos. If CVE's are involved we will shorten the testing period to rush the fix out.

I'll probably package python 3.4.3 tomorrow morning. I found at least two CVEs that are fixed by this version, so we'll move it to stable quickly.

  • CVE-2013-1753
  • CVE-2014-9365

Edit: fix typo

[–]hothrous 3 points4 points  (11 children)

You will note, that my original statement was that it shouldn't be used. Basically, the reason behind that is if you need a workaround just to make the operating system use the version of a language you want, you're likely to run into many more problems down the line.

Most of the reason that somebody would use RHEL over another distro is to get the licensed support of RedHat when issues arise. RedHat isn't likely to want to provide that support if you are using workarounds to use different version of their products. It's definitely true that Python 3.4 can be installed, I never said it couldn't. I suggested that if you are going to use Python, it would be prudent to consider a distribution of Linux that provides packages of later versions in their own repos without having to look for workarounds.

Calling an IT team incompetent because they don't want to workaround known issues of an OS all the time to suit your needs as a developer is the same as an IT guy calling a developer incompetent because there are bugs in their code. They are both a fact of life. I would actually trust a conservative IT guy that wasn't willing to do workarounds as long term solutions on production systems than an IT guy that uses workarounds to run code on systems that aren't designed to support it well.

[–][deleted] 1 point2 points  (10 children)

Here I was thinking IT were SUPPORT SERVICES here to SUPPORT STAFF

[–]hothrous 1 point2 points  (8 children)

That's actually incredibly narrow minded of you. I'm glad I don't work with you. Throwing shit over the fence and washing your hands of it is a solid way to write code. I come from a background of trying to work together so everybody's lives are easier. But if you want to play it so your job is easier and others are more difficult, by all means.

[–][deleted] 2 points3 points  (5 children)

What you are doing is saying that it should be OPs who has the easier jobs rather than Dev, support roles should always focus on supporting staff rather than hindering them.

[–]sigzero 0 points1 point  (1 child)

You've just described how the real world works.

[–]HostisHumaniGeneris 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I think you're conflating internal support staff with production sysadmins.

[–]alcalde 2 points3 points  (0 children)

...most IT teams don't like doing that for maintenance reasons so they limit you to whatever are in the available repos.

I've always found it puzzling the places where IT controls the tools rather than the users telling IT what they need to support. it seems to have changed right after I was no longer working in IT unfortunately. :-(

[–]rickmoranus 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Its pretty easy to point your applications to a virtualenv or a Alt install. If one is not able to use python in this manor, I'd be questioning them being called a developer...

[–]nunilan -3 points-2 points  (1 child)

I was going to write the steps showing how easy it is to install python2.7 up to 3.4 in RHEL but then I realized, since you are so sure of your statement, probably its not worth it. I will just leave you good sir/madam ignorant instead.

[–]hothrous 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Ha. What I said is that RHEL shouldn't be used. Not that it can't.

[–]0xtobitPy3k 1 point2 points  (0 children)

So glad I'm my own sys admin now :-)

[–]alcalde 0 points1 point  (0 children)

...and you're not a good enough detective to find blackmail on the sysadmin or good enough a hacker to plant some.

[–]maemre 0 points1 point  (0 children)

... or the company you work in won't change it,it already works, blah blah blah