[Release] DataStax Python Driver 3.29.0 for Apache Cassandra

[Bret McGuire]

Greetings!  Today we've released Python Driver 3.29.0 for Apache Cassandra!

This release includes a couple of significant changes for the Python driver.  First and most importantly we're implementing the platform support policy mentioned in previous releases.  According to that policy a given release will support all Python versions which are not EOL at the time of release.  As a result 3.29.0 includes official support for Python 3.8.x through 3.12.x.  Our intention is to follow this policy for all releases going forward.

I'm also very pleased to announce that six has been completely removed as a dependency of the Python driver!  This work was implemented by several members of our awesome community and represents a significant move away from Python 2.7.x.  Many thanks to everyone who was involved in this effort!

Wheels have been uploaded for Linux, Mac and Windows for Python versions 3.8 through 3.12... with one exception.  Python 3.12 wheels for Linux are delayed just a bit; these should be available in the very near future.

Docs are also just a bit delayed.  We'll have docs up soon on the usual site, but for now you can access the changelog (as well as the rest of our documentation) on Github.

Many thanks to all who educated fellow community members, made feature requests, contributed code, wrote documentation, and reported bugs. We encourage you to get involved too:

Discuss the driver and ask questions:
  - python-driver-user mailing list: https://groups.google.com/a/lists.datastax.com/forum/#!forum/python-driver-user
Review and contribute source code and documentation:
  - Driver for Apache Cassandra: https://github.com/datastax/python-driver
  - Report issues on JIRA: https://datastax-oss.atlassian.net/browse/PYTHON

Thanks!

- Bret -

[Bret McGuire]

   Greetings!  Just a quick follow-up to our announcement of the release of version 3.29.0.  Wheels for Python 3.12 on Linux have been uploaded to pypi and should now be available.  Our docs team has also published the documentation for this release; you can find those docs here.

   Thanks again to everyone who helped make this release happen!

   - Bret -