How to specify multiple author(s) / email(s) in setup.py

Question

We wrote a small wrapper to a twitter app and published this information to http://pypi.python.org. But setup.py just contained a single field for specifying email / name of the author. How do I specify multiple contributors / email list, to the following fields since we would like this package to be listed under our names, much similar to how it shows up in http://rubygems.org.

author='foo',
author_email='[email protected]',

Answer 1

As far as I know, setuptools doesn't support using a list of strings in order to specify multiple authors. Your best bet is to list the authors in a single string:

author='Foo Bar, Spam Eggs',
author_email='[email protected], [email protected]',

I'm not sure if PyPI validates the author_email field, so you may run into trouble with that one. In any case, I would recommend you limit these to a single author and mention all contributors in the documentation or description.

Some sources:

This has been registered as a bug, actually, but it seems like support for multiple authors was not implemented. Here is an alternative solution. Here is an idea for how to provide a contact email for a project with multiple authors.

Answer 2

I'm sort of just piggybacking off of @modocache's answer, in case you want some specifics.

Throughout this answer, I'll be refering to a python3.6 version of the FOO-PYTHON-ENV\Lib\distutils\dist.py file

To reiterate, you cannot use a list in the author field. Here's why:

Spoiler: Two methods belonging to the DistributionMetadata class are the reason --

def _read_field(name):
    value = msg[name]
    if value == 'UNKNOWN':
        return None
    return value

def _read_list(name):
    values = msg.get_all(name, None)
    if values == []:
        return None
    return values

Here's where you'll hit an error if you try to stick a list in the author field:

class DistributionMetadata:

#*...(R E D A C T E D)...*#

    def read_pkg_file(self, file):
        """Reads the metadata values from a file object."""
    #*...(R E D A C T E D)...*#
        # ####################################
        # Note the usage of _read_field() here
        # ####################################
        self.name = _read_field('name')
        self.version = _read_field('version')
        self.description = _read_field('summary')
        # we are filling author only.
        self.author = _read_field('author')
        self.maintainer = None
        self.author_email = _read_field('author-email')
        self.maintainer_email = None
        self.url = _read_field('home-page')
        self.license = _read_field('license')
    #*...(R E D A C T E D)...*#
        # ###################################
        # Note the usage of _read_list() here
        # ###################################
        self.platforms = _read_list('platform')
        self.classifiers = _read_list('classifier')
    #*...(R E D A C T E D)...*#

& Here's the whole thing:

class DistributionMetadata:
        """Dummy class to hold the distribution meta-data: name, version,
        author, and so forth.
        """

        _METHOD_BASENAMES = ("name", "version", "author", "author_email",
                     "maintainer", "maintainer_email", "url",
                     "license", "description", "long_description",
                     "keywords", "platforms", "fullname", "contact",
                     "contact_email", "classifiers", "download_url",
                     # PEP 314
                     "provides", "requires", "obsoletes",
                     )

    def __init__(self, path=None):
        if path is not None:
            self.read_pkg_file(open(path))
        else:
            self.name = None
            self.version = None
            self.author = None
            self.author_email = None
            self.maintainer = None
            self.maintainer_email = None
            self.url = None
            self.license = None
            self.description = None
            self.long_description = None
            self.keywords = None
            self.platforms = None
            self.classifiers = None
            self.download_url = None
            # PEP 314
            self.provides = None
            self.requires = None
            self.obsoletes = None

    def read_pkg_file(self, file):
        """Reads the metadata values from a file object."""
        msg = message_from_file(file)

        def _read_field(name):
            value = msg[name]
            if value == 'UNKNOWN':
                return None
            return value

        def _read_list(name):
            values = msg.get_all(name, None)
            if values == []:
                return None
            return values

        metadata_version = msg['metadata-version']
        self.name = _read_field('name')
        self.version = _read_field('version')
        self.description = _read_field('summary')
        # we are filling author only.
        self.author = _read_field('author')
        self.maintainer = None
        self.author_email = _read_field('author-email')
        self.maintainer_email = None
        self.url = _read_field('home-page')
        self.license = _read_field('license')

        if 'download-url' in msg:
            self.download_url = _read_field('download-url')
        else:
            self.download_url = None

        self.long_description = _read_field('description')
        self.description = _read_field('summary')

        if 'keywords' in msg:
            self.keywords = _read_field('keywords').split(',')

        self.platforms = _read_list('platform')
        self.classifiers = _read_list('classifier')

        # PEP 314 - these fields only exist in 1.1
        if metadata_version == '1.1':
            self.requires = _read_list('requires')
            self.provides = _read_list('provides')
            self.obsoletes = _read_list('obsoletes')
        else:
            self.requires = None
            self.provides = None
            self.obsoletes = None