Plans to upgrade Panda3D to Python 2.3 or 2.4?

General Discussion
1

Are there any plans to upgrade Panda3D to Python 2.3 or 2.4? I have a bunch of tools that use Python 2.3, which is installed on my system. I don’t have a compiler (except the free ones) and I don’t know if they will build correctly.

2

Yes, I was thinking about upgrading to the latest version somewhere in the 1.0.5 version. I’ve already successfully tried 2.4, and it seemed to work fine. So I don’t think it will be a big deal.

If you want to compile up a version of panda for 2.3 yourself, it’s straightforward. Download the panda3d source package, then just strip python out of the thirdparty tree and replace it with your preferred version. Also, copy the “python23.dll” into the python directory.

3

What compilers are supported for building from source under Windows?

4

One thing to consider is to group all Panda’s Python code under a directory (say panda) and have the installer place that under python/Lib/site-packages. So:

c:\python2.3\Lib\site-packages\panda\direct

etc.

I use Boa Constructor to write my Python and I can then create a Python file anywhere and import panda.direct etc.

This is the standard way of installing libraries into Python. Having Panda installed elsewhere (currently c:\panda-1.0.3) is a bit of a pain.

Essentially I tried to transpose Panda’s python scripts into site-packages, but I couldn’t get a Python application to pick them up.

Cheers

5

I was able to compile on windows using the Visual C++ toolkit, which is free from microsoft. You have to get some missing components from other free downloads.

There are a couple of threads about this here https://discourse.panda3d.org/viewtopic.php?t=340 and here https://discourse.panda3d.org/viewtopic.php?t=326

-Stampson

6

Btw, you know that you can download binaries for Python right? Pretty sure Panda will work directly with these binaries. Oh… hmmm… I guess that python interface bits are hardlinked to python22.dll?

Hugh

7

They’re probably generated based on Python 2.2, so Panda3D would have to be re-compiled from scratch to use 2.3 or 2.4.

Hopefully if a version of Panda3D is released for Python 2.3 or 2.4 I’ll try shoe-horning it into site-packages.

8

The next time I upgrade python, it will be to the latest version… currenly, 2.5. So there will probably never be a python-2.3 based panda distribution.

However, I’ve just released a version of panda that can be built (out-of-the-box) using the microsoft visual toolkit, which is a free download. You can now build your own.

9

Josh, that part your wrote about the using the free MS Visual Toolkit… Is that with a stock toolkit download and nothing else? (I’m not really sure what all is part of it since I’m a UNIX guy by trade) or do you mean with the toolkit plus that whole page of instructions that one of our community members put together… adding extra .dlls etc…?

Thanks,

Steve

10

You need:

  • Visual Toolkit. Install it with the default options.
  • MS Platform SDK. Again, install it with the default options.
  • DirectX SDK. Again, install it with the default options.

All three are free downloads from Microsoft. You don’t need to modify any of them. No extra DLLs or moving files around or anything like that.

11

Outstanding. This is great news!!

Makes things a lot easier.

Steve