Drop support for Python 3.4

[JWCook]

Python 3.4 reached EOL in March 2019, and it's been adding a bit of extra work to keep compatibility with it. I'd like to drop this in the release after the next one (which would be v0.11).

Things to clean up/restrictions that would no longer apply:

• Remove from tests and classifiers
• Remove typing backport and use the stdlib version
• Remove merge_two_dicts() and use {**dict, **dict} and other PEP 448 syntax
• Use latest pytest (4.7+)
• Use latest tox (3.15+)
• Use json.JSONDecodeError
• Remove other python 3.4-specific exceptions/workarounds
• Remove requirements.txt; known minimum required package versions are all specified in setup.py now, and remaining version pins are not needed

[abubelinha]

I have a machine at work which uses Windows XP 32bit.
Latest Python version for that OS is 3.4
Would it be possible to use pip to install pyinaturalist's latest python-3.4-compatible version?
If so, what's the pip command I should use?

Thanks a lot

[JWCook]

@abubelinha

pyinaturalist 0.10 was the last version that supported python 3.4. You should be able to pip install pyinaturalist and it will install the latest version available for your current python version. If for some reason that doesn't work (for example, if older releases are missing some package metadata), you can manually install the version you want with:

pip install pyinaturalist==0.10

To go back in time and see project info for past versions, you can use the version tags on:

• GitHub: code for 0.10
• Readthedocs: documentation for 0.10
• PyPI: package info for 0.10

Screenshots for how to get there:

GitHub

Branches/Tags drop-down in the upper left:

Readthedocs

Version drop-down in the lower left (Note: 'stable' is the current stable release, and 'latest' is the development version/main branch):

PyPI

Release History in the upper left:

[JWCook]

Would it help if I added a section to the docs that lists the last supported pyinaturalist version for each python version? Or let me know if you have any other suggestions for the documentation.

[abubelinha]

Yes, that would be useful.
But you decide it it worths the pain
(because you are really fast answering issues, thanks a lot !!).

[JWCook]

Added that info here under 'Python version compatibility': https://pyinaturalist.readthedocs.io/en/latest/user_guide.html#installation

[abubelinha]

How could I check the installed version of pyinaturalist from my pyinat.py script at runtime, before importing it?

I want to run the script in several machines, some of them with Python 3.8 and some others with 3.4 (so pyinaturalist 0.10)

As import syntax was different in old versions I need the script to know which one to use, so I can adapt it to follow the old doc examples when needed.

[JWCook]

Some thoughts on this:

• The previous imports (like from pyinaturalist.node_api import ...) will still work. They will show a DeprecationWarning starting in 0.14, and will eventually be removed in a future release.
• Windows XP and python 3.4 are ancient history, so it's going to be very hard to support if you run into problems... But I'm sure you already know that! Is there any possibility of installing a modern Linux distro as a dual-boot option, or using a live boot CD, or a VM, or Cygwin, or... anything but XP?
• If not: besides imports, there have been several changes to behavior since pyinaturalist 0.10, so I wouldn't recommend switching back and forth between versions. It might be better to just stick with 0.10.
• With 0.10, you may need to use add_photo_to_observation() for uploading photos after create_observation()
• If you need to, you can check the installed version like this:

  >>> from pyinaturalist import __version__
  >>> print(__version__)
  '0.13.0'

[abubelinha]

Thanks a lot for the recommendations and warnings.
Looks like it is a bad idea, so I think I'll try to avoid using WinXP computers for this.

[JWCook]

Great! I'd like to help support your classroom project if I can, and it will be much easier to make bugfixes, new features, etc. if you're using the latest version.