---
id: interchange
version: "2021.0.4"
license: Apache License, Version 2.0
license_treatment: permissive
maintenance: abandoned
---

# interchange — Data types and interchange formats

License: permissive · Maintenance: abandoned · Downloads: 98.3K/mo

## What it is and what it does

Interchange is a library for working with data types and interchange formats, offering modular support for collections, mathematical types, packstream serialization, spatial data, text handling, and temporal types. The library was designed to facilitate data exchange between systems by providing standardized representations and conversion utilities.

The package depends only on pytz and six, making it lightweight to install. However, it is no longer maintained—the repository was archived with the last commit on 2023-07-30, and no releases have occurred since 2021-10-14. This abandonment means no bug fixes, security patches, or compatibility updates will be provided for modern Python versions or emerging standards.

Use it for:

- Parsing and serializing packstream-formatted data in legacy systems or applications that depend on this format.
- Working with temporal and spatial data types in projects that already use this library and cannot migrate.
- Educational or reference purposes to understand data interchange design patterns from an older codebase.
- Maintaining existing applications that have a hard dependency on interchange and cannot be refactored.

## Worth the install?

AI-flagged interpretation of the facts above — verify before relying.

Interchange provides data types and interchange format utilities for serializing and deserializing structured data across different systems and formats.

No, unless you are maintaining an existing application that already depends on it. The project is abandoned with no maintenance since 2023-07-30, no security updates, and incomplete documentation. For new projects, choose an actively maintained alternative for data serialization and interchange formats.

## Install

pip install interchange
uv add interchange
poetry add interchange

## Installing interchange

Before you install: Installation is low-friction with only two lightweight runtime dependencies (pytz and six). However, the project is archived and abandoned, with the last commit on 2023-07-30 and no maintenance activity since—a significant concern for long-term reliability and security updates.

License in practice: Licensed under Apache License, Version 2.0, a permissive open-source license that allows commercial use, modification, and distribution with minimal restrictions, making it safe from a licensing standpoint for most projects.

Quickstart:

pip install interchange

import interchange
# Module structure includes collections, math, packstream, space, text, and time submodules

Project is archived and unmaintained since 2023-07-30; no active support or security updates available.

Verify before relying:

- Specific functionality and API surface of each submodule (collections, math, packstream, space, text, time) remain undocumented in the excerpt.
- Whether this package is actively used as a dependency by other maintained projects or if it has been superseded.
- Compatibility with Python versions beyond 3.9 given the project's abandoned status.

## Package facts

- License: Apache License, Version 2.0 (permissive)
- Python support: unspecified
- Install friction: low
- Maintenance: abandoned
- Downloads: 98.3K/month (top 15,000 on PyPI)
- Known vulnerabilities: none known

## Tags

data interchange format library, serialization deserialization, data type conversion, cross-system data exchange, structured data formats, packstream format, data interchange utilities, abandoned, serialization, legacy

[View on SkillFed](https://skillfed.io/packages/interchange) · [View on PyPI](https://pypi.org/project/interchange/)