eight

What it is and what it does

Eight is a lightweight Python 2–3 compatibility layer that lets you write code targeting Python 3.3+ while running it on Python 2.7 without code changes. It backports Python 3 builtins (like print as a function, new-style division, and unicode literals) and renamed modules (queue, configparser, etc.) to their Python 2 equivalents, and can optionally wrap standard I/O and environment variables to behave like Python 3.

The package depends only on future and installs as a pure-Python wheel. It is designed to be a lighter alternative to six or python-future, with an explicit bias toward Python 3: removing eight from your code leaves it functioning normally on Python 3. However, the project has been abandoned since 2021-03-16, making this relevant only for maintaining legacy systems.

Use it for:

• Maintain a single codebase that runs on both Python 2.7 and Python 3 without conditional imports or version checks.
• Port Python 3 code to Python 2.7 environments where migration is not yet possible.
• Wrap standard input/output to handle text consistently across Python 2 and 3 in legacy applications.
• Decode command-line arguments and environment variables uniformly across Python versions in existing tools.

Worth the install?

AI-flagged interpretation of the facts on this page — verify before relying

Eight provides a compatibility layer that lets you write Python 3 code and run it on Python 2.7 with minimal changes, offering Python 3 names and behaviors as backports.

No, unless you are actively maintaining a Python 2.7 codebase that cannot be migrated. The package is abandoned (last release 2021-03-16), and no security updates are forthcoming. For new projects, use Python 3 directly. For legacy systems, consider migrating to Python 3 or use a more actively maintained compatibility layer if absolutely necessary.

Install

eight on PyPI

pip install eight

uv add eight

poetry add eight

Installing eight

Before you install

Low install friction with a single pure-Python dependency (future). However, the package is abandoned—last release was 2021-03-16 with no activity since. Use only if maintaining legacy Python 2.7 codebases.

License in practice

Licensed under Apache Software License (permissive). You can use, modify, and distribute this code freely in commercial and private projects with minimal restrictions.

Quickstart

pip install eight

from eight import *
from eight import queue
from __future__ import print_function, division, unicode_literals, absolute_import

Requires Python 2.7 or Python 3.3+ to function; project is abandoned as of 2021-03-16.

Verify before relying

• Whether the package actually works reliably on modern Python 3 versions beyond 3.4 (last tested version in classifiers).
• How well the i18n support compares to six or python-future in practice.
• Whether abandonment affects compatibility with current Python 2 or 3 minor releases.
• Current viability for Python 2.7 environments given the age of the last release.

Package facts

Evidence: eight-1.0.1-py2.py3-none-any.whl

Tags

More Python Modules packages