The first alpha release of Python 2.5 [LWN.net]

The first Alpha release of version 2.5 of the Python language has been announced.

This is an *alpha* release of Python 2.5, and is the *first* alpha release. As such, it is not suitable for a production environment. It is being released to solicit feedback and hopefully discover bugs, as well as allowing you to determine how changes in 2.5 might impact you.

[Python] This is the first release in a series of alpha and beta releases. The final Python 2.5 will not arrive until August of 2006, according to the Python 2.5 Release Schedule. The document also lists the completed features, possible features and open issues for Python 2.5.

A series of Python Enhancement Proposals (PEPs) detail the new features. Some of them include:

Conditional Expressions similar to those found in C.
Partial Function Application for passing variable argument lists.
Metadata for Python Software Packages for documentation extensions.
Absolute and Relative Imports for extending the import statement functionality.
Executing modules as scripts which extends the -m command line option.
Unifying try-except and try-finally for improving the syntax of the try statement.
Coroutines via Enhanced Generators allows generators to be used as coroutines.
The "with" Statement a simplified replacement for try/finally statements.
Required Superclass for Exceptions for providing more standardized exception handling.
Using ssize_t as the index type which allows 64 bit element indexes.
Allowing Any Object to be Used for Slicing to loosen the slice index data type requirements.

The above announcement also lists some new modules: "New major modules added include hashlib, ElementTree, sqlite3 and ctypes. In addition, a new profiling module cProfile was added."

A.M. Kuchling's What's New in Python 2.5 document lists the above enhancements, and details some other modifications to the language. See the Python 2.5 release notes for more details on the new features and bug fixes in Python 2.5.

Downloads and more information are available on the Python 2.5 page.

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