Convert Python 2 Code to Python 3

Originally Posted on with tags: python
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I am working on a personal project putting my OpenSignTool Inkscape python extension app online. I plan to wrap the python code into a Flask web app and make the code run on a web server.

The extension app is written in Summer 2018 and mostly python 3 ready. However, they depend on several existing Inkscape extension modules. Those are all python 2 code written years ago by others. Specifically, the extension code depends on 6 python modules. These are

  • simplestyle.py
  • simplepath.py
  • simpletransform.py
  • inkex.py
  • cubicsuperpath.py
  • bezmisc.py

Originally I plan to test my app in python 3.7 and fix any errors that pop up. I work on fixing the code for one hour or two, and find that this approach is too timing consuming even for a small code base of a few hundred lines of code.

A little Google search finds that Python standard library includes a 2to3 tool that can do the job automatically. The documenation is pretty straightforward. This is the command I used to convert all python files in the current directory.

$2to3 -o ../dev_py3 -W -n ./

The option -o is to specify the output directory, -W is for writing files even not changed, and -n means that backups are not needed.

The tool is very useful, and it can figure out almost all changes. The place the tool has trouble figuring out is string encoding. I change a few places that involve string encoding, and the program runs perfectly in Python 3.

The Inkscape project is upgrading the extension system to be Python 3 compatible. The new extension python code are available online.