It would be really useful if you could provide a .zip Windows release of Python that is not crippled/for embedding only.

The reason is simply is that right now, I am having constant pain & trouble with it writing an automated build script for Windows (.bat) that works on a Python-free machine.

Specifically the installer has:

1.) no usable functionality in an automated build environment (%PATH% is very unnecessary or even undesirable to set up for a Python install only temporarily downloaded for a build)

2.) possibly conflicts with existing installs (making an automated build break/affect other Python installs/leaving other side effects, which is extremely undesirable and ugly)

3.) can break into a completely unusable state when interrupted (where the install doesn't complete, but running it again also doesn't, needing complicated special logic to nuke it)

NONE of these would be an issue if there was just a .zip. And there is, of course, in form of the embedded install - but that one is useless to me for an automated build because I need pip, and it doesn't support running pip.