Creating a simple distribution module

To understand better all the things I learned in Exercise 46, I am now going to create a simple distribution module which will work with distutils. Here is the documentation of how to create such a module with distutils.

I am creating a simple Python Pomodoro.

First, I copied the skeleton directory into another directory called 'pypomodoro'. Next I renamed the package directory 'NAME' to 'pypomodoro'. Next, in the tests directory, I renamed NAME_tests.py to pypomodoro_tests.py. Next, in setup.py I added 'pypomodoro' to the packages names parameter.

Packaging is usually a nightmare on all platforms... and it is not exception with Python, at least when learning it.

Anyways, here are some notes which I am hoping will help me understand all this better.

In Python project names usually use camel case. So I have renamed my python-pomodoro project to PyPomodoro.

The project directory will usually contain a few more directories and files.

PythonProject

\bin

\docs

\tests

__init__.py

module_name_tests.py

\main_project_module

__init__.py

module1.py

module2.py

setup.py

I realized that we refer to the terminology module for individual python files, as well as to directories. Directories which are modules however, must have a file called __init__.py

So, this is a bit confusing. A bit of Googling takes me to this tutorial on Python packages. This tutorial states

"Packages are a way of structuring Python's module namespace by using dotted module names"

This makes sense. Looks similar to packages in Java, but the term 'packages' in Python seems to be overloaded. I believe I also encountered it in the context of the thing which contains setup.py. Perhaps this is not a package, but a 'package distribution'.

We can import sub-modules like this:

import A.B

where we expect B to be a submodule of A. Note that B cannot be a function or a member inside A. It has to be a submodule. What this means is that the directory A, must have a file called __init__.py and also if B is a directory, it must have a file called __init__.py However, if B can also be a file. The __init__.py file is invoked when the module containing it is loaded. Here is a tutorial explaining the usage of __init__.py

Question: What if the module is loaded multiple times? Perhaps I should also ask the question, if a module CAN be loaded multiple times.