Description
pyserf - a shortcut for writing C extensions in C
Presented by Douglas Bagnall
Abstract
There are many clever ways of connecting Python and C code together, and pyserf is one of those. It is just a short script that parses a module outline and produces an idiomatic template for a C extension providing the same signatures, so all you need to do is write the bits that actually do stuff.
Outline
Pyserf is a tiny project that I wrote for my own use years ago and never released because it is so obvious that dozens of better versions must exist. The idea is simple -- you write an outline of a module like this:
"""module documentation"""
def top_level_function(int_a, float_b):
"function documentation"
return float_c
class SomeModule:
"""class documentation"""
def foo(self, int_ants obj_zoo):
"""method documentation"""
return float_frogs
and pyserf uses the parsing modules in the standard library to generate a C file that will compile to an extension providing the interface it describes, with the documentation appearing in the right place and the type conversions all properly handled. The generated file is not a hideous unreadable mess, rather it is within a few characters of best practise according to the official tutorial. Once you have this template, you abandon your outline and write the middles of each function in C. In describing what pyserf does, this talk will demonstrate what is required to write an extension in C by hand, and show you some ways of using the standard libraries parsing modules.
[VIDEO HAS ISSUES: Sound and video are poor. Slides are hard to read.]