Here are my comments on the py3k patch:

1. Sign of a PyLong object o is the same as the sign of Py_SIZE(o).  I 
would think it is safe to use this fact within python core.  (User code 
that may need to work across multiple versions of python may need to be 
more conservative.)

2. If you choose to use zero in the code, there is no need to create it 
twice per call.

3. Py_INCREF(zero); is unnecessary and creates a reference leak.

4. range_contains should return -1 when error is detected, not 0.

2.