Why is w9xpopen.exe bundled with Python 2.7 on Windows?

[ps16thypresence...@gmail.com]

According to the message box that appears when it is run, w9xpopen.exe is only used on Windows 95/98. If that is the case, why it is still included in Python 2.7, since Python 2.5.4 is the last version that works on Windows 9x?

I've been excluding w9xpopen.exe in my py2exe setup script for my Python application, since my app won't run on Windows 9x anyway. Is there still some good reason to include it that I'm not aware of?

[Terry Reedy]

On 8/29/2014 6:08 PM, ps16thypresence...@gmail.com wrote:
> According to the message box that appears when it is run,
> w9xpopen.exe is only used on Windows 95/98. If that is the case, why
> it is still included in Python 2.7,

Please be more specific as to python installer source, python version,
and location. I do not see it in my 2.7.8 directory installed by the psf
.msi installer.

--
Terry Jan Reedy

[ps16thypresence...@gmail.com]

On Friday, August 29, 2014 8:54:47 PM UTC-4, Terry Reedy wrote:
> Please be more specific as to python installer source, python version,
>
> and location. I do not see it in my 2.7.8 directory installed by the psf
>
> .msi installer.

I'm also using the Python 2.7.8 MSI installer from the PSF, but the 32-bit version of it. The file is in the top-level Python27 directory.
I just checked, and a 64-bit installation of Python 2.7 that I have access to doesn't contain w9xpopen.exe. Are you using the 64-bit version?
I don't see the need for it in the 32-bit version either, unless there's a reason I'm not aware of.

-- Timothy

[Terry Reedy]

The tracker has a search function. Searching all issues for 'w9xpopen'
turned up 15 issues including
http://bugs.python.org/issue2405
The last msg by (benrg) starts "on Windows 7 32-bit with COMSPEC
pointing to command.com, platform.popen('dir').read() works with
w9xpopen and fails (no output) without it."

http://bugs.python.org/issue14470
In 3.4, we no longer support platforms that set COMSPEC to command.com,
hence 'BOOM'.

--
Terry Jan Reedy

[ps16thypresence...@gmail.com]

Thanks, that's interesting. It seems odd to me that w9xpopen.exe (because of its name) is still used on Windows 7, so I can see why it was removed in Python 3.4.
Since I don't use the popen function at all in my application, I think it should be OK to exclude w9xpopen.exe in my py2exe setup script, especially since it's suggested in the change log for py2exe 0.6.3 (http://www.py2exe.org/old/).

[Terry Reedy]

On 8/30/2014 10:45 AM, ps16thypresence...@gmail.com wrote:
> Thanks, that's interesting. It seems odd to me that w9xpopen.exe
> (because of its name) is still used on Windows 7,

Yes, the name is confusing. It is not about running on Windows 9X, but
about running popen on later systems that act like Windows 9X by using
command.com instead of cmd.com. I am sure that such systems have to be
customized one by one, and are only customized by people (corporations)
with legacy scripts that depend on the peculiarities of command.com

> so I can see why it was removed in Python 3.4.

And not before, because we are slow to break Python on old systems.

> Since I don't use the popen function at
> all in my application, I think it should be OK to exclude
> w9xpopen.exe in my py2exe setup script, especially since it's
> suggested in the change log for py2exe 0.6.3
> (http://www.py2exe.org/old/).

That seems reasonable. Depending on your target audience, it might be
reasonable to omit it even if you do use popen.

--
Terry Jan Reedy