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Automake provides support for Python compilation with the
PYTHON
primary. A typical setup is to call
AM_PATH_PYTHON
in configure.ac and use a line like the
following in Makefile.am:
python_PYTHON = tree.py leave.py
Any files listed in a _PYTHON
variable will be byte-compiled
with py-compile
at install time. py-compile
actually creates both standard (.pyc) and optimized
(.pyo) byte-compiled versions of the source files. Note that
because byte-compilation occurs at install time, any files listed in
noinst_PYTHON
will not be compiled. Python source files are
included in the distribution by default, prepend nodist_
(as in
nodist_python_PYTHON
) to omit them.
Automake ships with an Autoconf macro called AM_PATH_PYTHON
that will determine some Python-related directory variables (see
below). If you have called AM_PATH_PYTHON
from
configure.ac, then you may use the variables
python_PYTHON
or pkgpython_PYTHON
to list Python source
files in your Makefile.am, depending on where you want your files
installed (see the definitions of pythondir
and
pkgpythondir
below).
Search for a Python interpreter on the system. This macro takes three
optional arguments. The first argument, if present, is the minimum
version of Python required for this package: AM_PATH_PYTHON
will skip any Python interpreter that is older than VERSION.
If an interpreter is found and satisfies VERSION, then
ACTION-IF-FOUND is run. Otherwise, ACTION-IF-NOT-FOUND is
run.
If ACTION-IF-NOT-FOUND is not specified, as in the following
example, the default is to abort configure
.
AM_PATH_PYTHON([2.2])
This is fine when Python is an absolute requirement for the package.
If Python >= 2.5 was only optional to the package,
AM_PATH_PYTHON
could be called as follows.
AM_PATH_PYTHON([2.5],, [:])
AM_PATH_PYTHON
creates the following output variables based on
the Python installation found during configuration.
PYTHON
¶The name of the Python executable, or ‘:’ if no suitable interpreter could be found.
Assuming ACTION-IF-NOT-FOUND is used (otherwise ./configure
will abort if Python is absent), the value of PYTHON
can be used
to setup a conditional in order to disable the relevant part of a build
as follows.
AM_PATH_PYTHON(,, [:]) AM_CONDITIONAL([HAVE_PYTHON], [test "$PYTHON" != :])
PYTHON_VERSION
¶The Python version number, in the form major.minor (e.g., ‘2.5’). This is currently the value of ‘sys.version[:3]’.
PYTHON_PREFIX
¶The string ‘${prefix}’. This term may be used in future work
that needs the contents of Python’s ‘sys.prefix’, but general
consensus is to always use the value from configure
.
PYTHON_EXEC_PREFIX
¶The string ‘${exec_prefix}’. This term may be used in future work
that needs the contents of Python’s ‘sys.exec_prefix’, but general
consensus is to always use the value from configure
.
PYTHON_PLATFORM
¶The canonical name used by Python to describe the operating system, as given by ‘sys.platform’. This value is sometimes needed when building Python extensions.
pythondir
¶The directory name for the site-packages subdirectory of the standard Python install tree.
pkgpythondir
¶This is the directory under pythondir
that is named after the
package. That is, it is ‘$(pythondir)/$(PACKAGE)’. It is provided
as a convenience.
pyexecdir
¶This is the directory where Python extension modules (shared libraries) should be installed. An extension module written in C could be declared as follows to Automake:
pyexec_LTLIBRARIES = quaternion.la quaternion_SOURCES = quaternion.c support.c support.h quaternion_la_LDFLAGS = -avoid-version -module
pkgpyexecdir
¶This is a convenience variable that is defined as ‘$(pyexecdir)/$(PACKAGE)’.
All these directory variables have values that start with either ‘${prefix}’ or ‘${exec_prefix}’ unexpanded. This works fine in Makefiles, but it makes these variables hard to use in configure. This is mandated by the GNU coding standards, so that the user can run ‘make prefix=/foo install’. The Autoconf manual has a section with more details on this topic (see Installation Directory Variables in The Autoconf Manual). See also Installing to Hard-Coded Locations.
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