The NormalizedVersion class is not correctly sorting rc1:

>>> from packaging.version import NormalizedVersion
>>> NormalizedVersion('0.7.0') < NormalizedVersion('0.7.0rc1')
True
>>> NormalizedVersion('0.7.0rc1')
NormalizedVersion('0.7rc1')
>>> NormalizedVersion('0.7.0') < NormalizedVersion('0.7.0a1')
False
>>> NormalizedVersion('0.7.0') < NormalizedVersion('0.7.0c1')
False

Here is a patch that I made against distutils2 tip. I have changed _FINAL_MARKER from 'f' to 'z', which works with rc. Also I have added constant _FINAL_MARKER_CHAR, since later in the code you make a check against 'f' and it surprised me a little at first. There are also tests in the patch. I hope it's good to make patch against the distutils2, since I couldn't yet find packaging in cpython default branch.

Thanks, looks great!

Why does the code use both a string and a singleton tuple?

The reason for the use of two constants is that previously there was comparison in the code with a hardcoded 'f':

            if postdev[0] == 'f':

I think it's a common practice to create constants for such hardcoded values. Also this hit when I was making a patch. I didn't know, that 'f' was used in the code and when I changed _FINAL_MARKER to ('f',), some tests failed. Alternatively to what I did in the patch you can use:

             if postdev[0] == _FINAL_MARKER[0]:

but it just doesn't feel right for me.

Anyway, I can't find packaging package in default branch of python. Where is the development done? I'd be happy to try to provide some more patches for this package, if there is a need for any.

> I think it's a common practice to create constants for such hardcoded
> values.

Yep, _FINAL_MARKER is clearer here that a cryptic character.  An alternate fix would be to use a c as rc marker (like what Python itself does in sys.hexversion and elsewhere).

I’ll see if I can use only one object instead of two.

> Anyway, I can't find packaging package in default branch of python.
The merge started at the PyCon sprints is still underway at https://bitbucket.org/tarek/cpython/  Follow the fellowship ML for details.  There’ll be an announcement on python-dev too when it’s complete, and then we’ll restart fixing bugs.

I understand that ML is mailing list, but I have no idea what is fellowship mailing list. Could you elaborate on this?

http://groups.google.com/group/the-fellowship-of-the-packaging/

New changeset 2105ab8553b7 by Éric Araujo in branch 'default':
Add tests for comparing candidate and final versions in packaging (#11841).
http://hg.python.org/cpython/rev/2105ab8553b7

I couldn’t reproduce the bugs but added the tests.  Thanks!

I don’t remember how I did it last time, but yesterday I was able to reproduce the bug.  I have added unit tests, as the lines I added to the doctest were actually no run (I’m working on it in #13953), and applied the fix.  I will push shortly.

New changeset 32cb52bee738 by Éric Araujo in branch 'default':
Fix comparison bug with 'rc' versions in packaging.version (#11841).
http://hg.python.org/cpython/rev/32cb52bee738

New changeset c82c97b2eae1 by Éric Araujo in branch 'default':
Fix comparison bug with 'rc' versions (#11841)
http://hg.python.org/distutils2/rev/c82c97b2eae1

New changeset 7d1a7251d771 by Éric Araujo in branch 'python3':
Merge fixes for #13974, #6884 and #11841 from default
http://hg.python.org/distutils2/rev/7d1a7251d771

Thanks again for the patch.  Next time I say that I couldn’t reproduce a bug, please insist :)

I prefer to be humble and trust core devs, when I post some patch to a codebase I don't know very well. I am glad you managed to reproduce it and I could help :-)

Having push rights does not make me smarter :)