The development guide(http://docs.python.org/devguide/setup.html) suggested that one can build with "--prefix=/dev/null" in order to avoid accidentally install it. But in the Modules/Setup.dist the zlib module is defined as:

zlib zlibmodule.c -I$(prefix)/include -L$(exec_prefix)/lib -lz

So configure with "--prefix=/dev/null " and enable zlib in Module/Setup and then make results in such error: (debian 5)

cc1: error: /dev/null/include: Not a directory


Not sure if this is really a problem. But I need to modify the Module/Setup zlib line to
"""
zlib zlibmodule.c -L$(exec_prefix)/lib -lz
"""
instead of just uncomment it to make my build process success. I think it's better to be improved.

Well, IIUC the Setup lines indicate where to find the system version of the libraries (otherwise the included zlib is used).  So I'm not at all sure that there is a bug here.  If you change Setup, you need to change it correctly for your intended installation.

Isn’t zlib built by setup.py anyway?

Well, using $(prefix)/include to fetch development headers sounds like the wrong strategy anyway. Just because you e.g. install into /usr/local doesn't mean your zlib is inside /usr/local too.

And if that makes people use our own zlib headers by mistake, then it's doubly wrong IMO.

FWIW, I recall that I built 2.7 a while back with --prefix=/home/user/something and it also failed to find zlib. Due to lack of time, I didn't debug it very deeply then, though.

I normally build using --prefix, often with --prefix=/dev/null, and I can't recall any version not building zlib.  Of course, I don't uncomment the zlib entry in Modules/Setup.

As far as I can see the zlib entry is unique in Setup in using prefix, so it probably is a bug (or, rather, a holdover from when there were various issues with the platform zlib).

Isn’t zlib built by setup.py anyway?


If can be build by Modules/Setup first as a builtin module, then the setup.py woun't build it.

ysj.ray:

As you're on Debian, the real cause of this might be issue 11715. The Modules/Setup.dist line for zlib is commented out, so it's only an example of how to enable zlib if it's not found automatically.

Can you try again now that issue 11715 has been fixed?

Closing due to lack of feedback.