scipy_2014_python-cmake-buildsystem_poster: SciPy 2014 - Python CMake build system

This poster was presented at SciPy 2014 conference. It describes a system for faster, straightforward cross-platform CPython builds across HPC, desktop, and mobile platforms with multiple build system generators and easy integration with C/C++/Fortran scientific computing libraries.

While the Python language has seen multiple implementations across a number of languages as it has grown in popularity, the original C-implementation of Python, CPython, remains the most widely adopted implementation for scientific computing. This can be largely attributed to the ubiquitous presence of C-build systems on scientific computing platforms and the large number of libraries that have a C interface, which are bridged with C-Python Extension Modules.

CMake is a popular cross-platform build system that performs reliable system introspection and configuration of C/C++/Fortran builds.

The scientific computing community has tooled the python.org C-Python distribution with a CMake configuration so CPython can be built with the CMake build system.

This enables cross-compilation for HPC clusters, the raspberry PI, and ARM architectures such as those found in mobile platforms, static and shared builds, and a static python with C extension modules included in the library, for example. Additionally, it provides capabilities such as faster compilation, cross-platform builds with multiple build system generators, easy integration with other CMake configured projects, and configuration and linking other scientific computing libraries into C-Extensions. It is a community maintained, open source project available on Github with nightly test results submitted to a software quality dashboard.