How to build Python C extension modules with autotools

Question

Most of the documentation available for building Python extension modules uses distutils, but I would like to achieve this by using the appropriate python autoconf & automake macros instead.

I'd like to know if there is an open source project out there that does exactly this. Most of the ones I've found end up relying on a setup.py file. Using that approach works, but unfortunately ends up rebuilding the entire source tree any time I make a modification to the module source files.

Answer 1

All PyGTK extensions use autotools, so if the PyGTK aspects don't kill the whole thing for you, it might be worth having a look at the PyGTK source code. Additionally, here is one I wrote which is more simple.