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Copyright (c) 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011
Python Software Foundation. All rights reserved.
Python 3.x is a new version of the language, which is incompatible with the 2.x
line of releases. The language is mostly the same, but many details, especially
how built-in objects like dictionaries and strings work, have changed
considerably, and a lot of deprecated features have finally been removed.
Build Instructions
------------------
On Unix, Linux, BSD, OSX, and Cygwin:
./configure
make
make test
sudo make install
This will install Python as python3.
You can pass many options to the configure script; run "./configure --help" to
find out more. On OSX and Cygwin, the executable is called python.exe;
elsewhere it's just python.
On Mac OS X, if you have configured Python with --enable-framework, you should
use "make frameworkinstall" to do the installation. Note that this installs the
Python executable in a place that is not normally on your PATH, you may want to
set up a symlink in /usr/local/bin.
On Windows, see PCbuild/readme.txt.
If you wish, you can create a subdirectory and invoke configure from there. For
example:
mkdir debug
cd debug
../configure --with-pydebug
make
make test
(This will fail if you *also* built at the top-level directory. You should do a
"make clean" at the toplevel first.)
What's New
----------
We try to have a comprehensive overview of the changes in the "What's New in
Python 3.2" document, found at
http://docs.python.org/3.2/whatsnew/3.2.html
For a more detailed change log, read Misc/NEWS (though this file, too, is
incomplete, and also doesn't list anything merged in from the 2.7 release under
development).
If you want to install multiple versions of Python see the section below
entitled "Installing multiple versions".
Documentation
-------------
Documentation for Python 3.2 is online, updated daily:
http://docs.python.org/3.2/
It can also be downloaded in many formats for faster access. The documentation
is downloadable in HTML, PDF, and reStructuredText formats; the latter version
is primarily for documentation authors, translators, and people with special
formatting requirements.
Testing
-------
To test the interpreter, type "make test" in the top-level directory. This runs
the test set twice (once with no compiled files, once with the compiled files
left by the previous test run). The test set produces some output. You can
generally ignore the messages about skipped tests due to optional features which
can't be imported. If a message is printed about a failed test or a traceback
or core dump is produced, something is wrong.
By default, tests are prevented from overusing resources like disk space and
memory. To enable these tests, run "make testall".
IMPORTANT: If the tests fail and you decide to mail a bug report, *don't*
include the output of "make test". It is useless. Run the failing test
manually, as follows:
./python -m test -v test_whatever
(substituting the top of the source tree for '.' if you built in a different
directory). This runs the test in verbose mode.
Release Schedule
----------------
See PEP 392 for release details: http://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0392/