| Page Status: | Complete |
|---|---|
| Last Reviewed: | 2016-01-22 |
This is a list of currently active interoperability specifications maintained by the Python Packaging Authority.
The current core metadata file format, version 1.2, is specified in PEP 345.
However, the version specifiers and environment markers sections of that PEP have been superceded as described below. In addition, metadata files are permitted to contain the following additional field:
A string containing the name of an optional feature. Must be a valid Python identifier. May be used to make a dependency conditional on whether the optional feature has been requested.
Example:
Provides-Extra: pdf Requires-Dist: reportlab; extra == 'pdf'
A second distribution requires an optional dependency by placing it inside square brackets, and can request multiple features by separating them with a comma (,). The requirements are evaluated for each requested feature and added to the set of requirements for the distribution.
Example:
Requires-Dist: beaglevote[pdf] Requires-Dist: libexample[test, doc]
Two feature names test and doc are reserved to mark dependencies that are needed for running automated tests and generating documentation, respectively.
It is legal to specify Provides-Extra: without referencing it in any
Requires-Dist:.
Version numbering requirements and the semantics for specifying comparisons between versions are defined in PEP 440.
The version specifiers section in this PEP supersedes the version specifiers section in PEP 345.
The dependency specifier format used to declare a dependency on another component is defined in PEP 508.
The environment markers section in this PEP supersedes the environment markers section in PEP 345.
The source distribution format (sdist) is not currently formally defined.
Instead, its format is implicitly defined by the behaviour of the
standard library's distutils module when executing the setup.py sdist
command.
The binary distribution format (wheel) is defined in PEP 427.
The platform compatibility tagging model used for wheel distribution is
defined in PEP 425.
The scheme defined in that PEP is insufficient for public distribution
of Linux wheel files (and *nix wheel files in general), so PEP 513 was
created to define the manylinux1 tag.
The format used to record installed packages and their contents is defined in PEP 376.
Note that only the dist-info directory and the RECORD file format from
that PEP are currently implemented in the default packaging toolchain.
The current interface for querying available package versions and retrieving packages from an index server is defined in PEP 503.