Details
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Suggestion
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Resolution: Done
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Not Evaluated
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Description
Python's setup.py install command has the side-effect of compiling all Python files into byte-compiled .pyc files.
These files were quite relevant when invented (they existed 1996 in Python 1.4, at least).
In 25 years, computation speed might have increased by a factor of 10.000, while project sizes may also have increased by a factor of 100. So as a conservative estimate, .pyc files are probably only 1 hundredth as important, today.
The time saved by this is no longer relevant, and because by the limited API it is unclear if the byte-compiled Python version will be used at all, it is preferable to skip the creation of these files completely.
A remaining problem we should be aware of is that by omitting .pyc file creation, this might become an issue when the files are created later on the target machine.