distutils doc contains lots of XXX

[florentx]

BPO	13716
Nosy	@birkenfeld, @tarekziade, @merwok, @florentx

^{Note: these values reflect the state of the issue at the time it was migrated and might not reflect the current state.}

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GitHub fields:

assignee = 'https://github.com/merwok'
closed_at = <Date 2012-02-26.03:21:50.271>
created_at = <Date 2012-01-05.19:02:15.569>
labels = ['type-feature', 'docs']
title = 'distutils doc contains lots of XXX'
updated_at = <Date 2012-02-26.03:21:50.269>
user = 'https://github.com/florentx'

bugs.python.org fields:

activity = <Date 2012-02-26.03:21:50.269>
actor = 'eric.araujo'
assignee = 'eric.araujo'
closed = True
closed_date = <Date 2012-02-26.03:21:50.271>
closer = 'eric.araujo'
components = ['Documentation']
creation = <Date 2012-01-05.19:02:15.569>
creator = 'flox'
dependencies = []
files = []
hgrepos = []
issue_num = 13716
keywords = []
message_count = 9.0
messages = ['150683', '150745', '150793', '150798', '150800', '150801', '152686', '154299', '154307']
nosy_count = 6.0
nosy_names = ['georg.brandl', 'tarek', 'eric.araujo', 'flox', 'docs@python', 'python-dev']
pr_nums = []
priority = 'normal'
resolution = 'fixed'
stage = 'resolved'
status = 'closed'
superseder = None
type = 'enhancement'
url = 'https://bugs.python.org/issue13716'
versions = ['Python 2.7', 'Python 3.2', 'Python 3.3']

[florentx]

http://docs.python.org/distutils/apiref.html?highlight=XXX#module-distutils.ccompiler

We find lots of "XXX" and "XXX see also." which give no information.

[merwok]

Tarek ruled that time spent improving the distutils docs was time lost and better spent on distutils2. Accordingly, I only fix clear bugs in the doc but don’t improve them in any way. I’m inclined to close this as wontfix, or I can remove the XXX if you’re strongly against them. (For the packaging docs, I will fix them properly.)

[birkenfeld]

I would make comments out of the XXX, and if a whole section is just that XXX, remove the section as well.

[merwok]

These are the XXX:

XXX true? does ANSI say anything about this?
XXX defaults to what?
XXX see also.
XXX see also.
XXX see also.
XXX see also.
XXX see also.

The first two are questions that can be answered, and when I research them for the packaging docs I could also backport the changes to the distutils docs; what to do for the other instances is less clear, so just deleting may be better than turning them into comments that will never get solved.

[birkenfeld]

Agreed.

[florentx]

The proposed solution is ok.

It sounds like unfinished documentation when you hit an "XXX".
For the "/dev/" documentation, it's OK, but for the released version, we should avoid it.

[python-dev]

New changeset 3d25869fce0c by Éric Araujo in branch '3.2':
Hide or remove user-visible XXX notes from distutils doc (bpo-13716).
http://hg.python.org/cpython/rev/3d25869fce0c

New changeset 1cb9b8126534 by Éric Araujo in branch 'default':
Merge edits from 3.2 (bpo-13716, bpo-1040439, bpo-2945, bpo-13770, bpo-6715)
http://hg.python.org/cpython/rev/1cb9b8126534

[python-dev]

New changeset e853ea9efc6e by Éric Araujo in branch '2.7':
Hide or remove user-visible XXX notes from distutils doc (bpo-13716).
http://hg.python.org/cpython/rev/e853ea9efc6e

[merwok]

Done.