René's URL Explorer Experiment

{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"DiscussionForumPosting","headline":"Wheel distributables include unnecessary files","articleBody":"# Context\r\n\r\nWe are using matplotlib,  and we are building our own wheel-distributables built for our systems. Basically, we are not only doing this for matplotlib, but for most python dependencies of our services.\r\nWe are using the devpi-builder script (https://github.com/blue-yonder/devpi-builder) to do this, which essentially wraps `pip wheel PACKAGE` calls.\r\n\r\n# Issue\r\n\r\nThe issue with matplotlib is, that it is set up in a way, that test images end up in the resulting wheels, this leads to wheel sizes of up to 50 MBs, when without these files and directories, wheel sizes would be ~ 6-13 MB.\r\n\r\nNote that on Pypi, matplotlib wheels are smaller, i.e. they don't contain these files and directories.\r\n\r\nI looked around a little and stumbled over https://github.com/MacPython/matplotlib-wheels/blob/master/rm_test_images.py . I.e. We are not the only ones facing this problem and I assume that somewhere in the manylinux wheel build scripts there probably is a similar logic to remove these files. I'd rather have it the other way around: Don't have these files included by default.\r\n\r\n# How it should be\r\n\r\nMatplotlib's default behaviour should be to not include the test images by default. If there are use cases where such files are needed in a wheel, inclusion should only be opt-in.\r\n\r\nSo, `pip wheel matplotlib` shouldn't produce a wheel that contain the large test images.\r\n\r\n# PS\r\n\r\nActually I'd prefer wheel releases to be free of any test-suite related stuff. If I need to run unit tests against a built Python wheel, I can take the test suite from the source distribution (as in http://doc.devpi.net/latest/quickstart-releaseprocess.html#devpi-test-testing-an-uploaded-package) if need be. Anyway, for the scope of this issue, I'd be happy if wheel sizes were reasonably small by default.","author":{"url":"https://github.com/HolgerPeters","@type":"Person","name":"HolgerPeters"},"datePublished":"2017-01-05T10:02:46.000Z","interactionStatistic":{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":"https://schema.org/CommentAction","userInteractionCount":5},"url":"https://github.com/7745/matplotlib/issues/7745"}