# PEP 660 and setuptools

**URL:** <https://discuss.python.org/t/pep-660-and-setuptools/14855>\
**Category:** Packaging\
**Created:** [April 5, 2022, 6:46pm UTC](https://discuss.python.org/t/pep-660-and-setuptools/14855 "2022-04-05T18:46:22Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 15

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**Author:** ![pf\_moore](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/discuss.python.org/pf_moore/32/35_2.png) [@pf\_moore](https://discuss.python.org/u/pf_moore)\
**Post date:** [April 14, 2022, 10:24am UTC](https://discuss.python.org/t/pep-660-and-setuptools/14855/15 "2022-04-14T10:24:41Z")

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> [@abravalheri](#):
>
> I think I manage to workaround that in [setuptools/editable\_wheel.py at 891711f4558d58c1b6ca2ddc291ecdbcebc18a6f · abravalheri/setuptools · GitHub](https://github.com/abravalheri/setuptools/blob/891711f4558d58c1b6ca2ddc291ecdbcebc18a6f/setuptools/command/editable_wheel.py#L493-L542).

Oh cool! Would you be willing to contribute that to the `editables` project (assuming it does work 😉) I couldn’t find a way that implemented all of the required semantics.

The key problem is that PEP 420 [requires](https://peps.python.org/pep-0420/#dynamic-path-computation) that changes to the filesystem _while the Python process is running_ must be picked up. There’s an example in the PEP [here](https://peps.python.org/pep-0420/#id2), and I’m pretty sure I wasn’t able to make that work with a meta\_path hook.

I agree this is an obscure case. I’ve no idea whether it’s acceptable to break it for editable installs. In `editables` I chose to document that it didn’t work and let the caller (backend) decide which trade-off they preferred.

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_[View the full topic](https://discuss.python.org/t/pep-660-and-setuptools/14855)._