We’re happy to announce that the Python 3 preview of the ftrack Python API (ftrack-python-api) is available today!
ftrack’s API empowers developers to write custom Python scripts that talk directly to an ftrack server. Using this approach, ftrack becomes completely pliable – studios can tailor it to their unique pipeline and create a solution that works uniquely for them.
Although our Python 2.7 implementation of the ftrack API has made a big difference to many studios, we’ve been working hard to bring it over to the newer, fresher and faster Python 3, with the aim of a better and more consistent experience for our users all around the globe. And we’d like you to try it out.
You can find installation instructions and further information about frack-python-api for Python 3 via the link below, followed by some more information about our reasons for making the switch.
Why we’re moving to Python 3
Firstly, Python 3 has now reached widespread support. The new language has experienced rapid innovation and now boasts a long list of very useful improvements. Python 2, meanwhile, has become increasingly associated with a growing maintenance burden over the years.
Secondly, this announcement comes as part of our long-term commitment to following the standard laid out by the VFX Reference Platform.
The VFX Reference Platform outlines a set of tools and library versions to be used as a common target platform when building solutions for the VFX industry.
Recently, the VFX Reference Platform requested that software vendors provide a preview release of Python 3 applications to aid studios when they migrate over to the latest version of the programming language themselves – hence today’s launch of our Python 3 ftrack API preview.
How you can help
We’ve been working on hard to ensure Python 3 won’t affect the way our ftrack API currently works. We want to make sure that any use of this new language meets the needs of our users and that the ftrack API remains as pliable and accessible as our Python 2 implementation.
There’s always room for improvement, however, so we invite you to try out our Python 3 preview of ftrack-python-api. The VFX industry deadline of 2020 for moving to Python 3 is approaching quickly, so we encourage developers to explore the Python 3 API and let us know of any issues that surface.
Please let us know your feedback or about any issues you find in the forum thread or via email – your thoughts are extremely valuable to us and will help us to build a product that works for you.
The ftrack API
The ftrack-python-api enables users to modify and customise ftrack to match their specific needs. If you have specific requirements as a studio or an individual user, ftrack’s fully Pythonic and object-oriented Python API enables you to easily customise and extend ftrack, while retaining all the same features as those available from the server, such as user permissions and custom entities. You can make ftrack work exactly the way you need it to.
Access the ftrack-python-api on Bitbucket here. The Python 3 version of the API is fully backwards compatible with Python 2.7.
