Re: [pygame] What's next for Pygame project?

On Sun, Jul 12, 2015 at 5:15 AM, Peter Shinners <pete@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

The cffi style bindings would be so tempting because they get away from all the binary challenges. Originally, the SDL bindings needed some utility C code to be useful. After a quick review of SDL2, that seems way less true.

I was hoping to find better hosting on the Bitbucket site for open soure projects, but I could not. Not even I have access to the repo. (Not that I would have used it in the last many years).

On 07/11/2015 05:20 PM, Lenard Lindstrom wrote:

Hi Peter,

On 15-07-10 07:47 PM, Peter Shinners wrote:

I haven't been paying close attention to Pygame, but it doesn't seem controversial to say things have stalled. I haven't gotten much feedback from Rene, but I'd like to give him time to put something together. Some of the main things that may need help are:

* Getting 1.9.2 actually released

Much of the delay is due to logistics. With the loss of the automated build site a few years back there is no simple way to check a commit against all supported operating systems. It also limits user testing.

I need someone to take over official Windows support from me, since I am stuck on Windows XP. I have the MinGW based dependency build chain working again for 32bit Windows, but did not get everything to build for 64bit Windows. So no official 64bit prebuilt libraries yet on the Bitbucket download page.

Pygame 1.9.2 is nearly ready for release on Linux. I have tackled the Linux specific issues I could find, and am now going through the operating system independent issues.

* Moving on to "Pygame 2", whatever that means

Yes, Pygame 2 is overdue. A while back I proposed we wait until Pygame 1.9.2 was released before starting on 2.0. The plan was to clear out the Pygame bugs with SDL 1.2 before moving on to SDL 2. But I also expected we would be done with 1.9.2 long before now.

Anyway, a few months back I started a Pygame 1.9.2 patch, https://bitbucket.org/llindstrom/pygame-1.10-patch, that replaces SDL 1.2 with SDL 2.0 api calls. Though it uses SDL 2, it tries to remain Pygame 1.9.2 compatible, so adds no new SDL 2 features. It is only a bridge to Pygame 2.0. Though it fails unit tests and needs more work, it is usable now with SDL 2 from GIT (Earlier SDL 2 releases have buggy 24 bits-per-pixel surface support.).

The structure of SDL 2 differs from SDL 1.2. It does not fit well Pygame's api. So I expect a significant redesign of modules and classes for Pygame 2. For instance, the display module will basically go away, replaced with a Window class.

This is an opportunity to replace C coded extension modules with Cython and a Python level foreign function interface. Personally, I would like to see Pygame fully support PyPy as well as CPython. Also, some of the Pygame code can be separated out as stand-alone, Python independent, libraries to encourage support from outside the Pygame community.

* Catch up on the Bitbucket pull requests

The 5 member limit for a Bitbucket project team is a nuisance.

* Website replacement and love
* Migrate forum to Reddit (or community forum)

It seems there are still many great people involved with the Pygame project. Perhaps I can help by getting those people the control they need to make progress. I'm completely detached from things at this point, so I don't have any context to jump in and try to change anything. What parts of the project are going well these days?