[Fedora-packaging] purpose of ruby(abi), python(abi), etc

[Bill Nottingham]

Vít Ondruch (vondruch at redhat.com) said: 
> Hi,
> 
> Can somebody enlighten me, what is the purpose of ruby(abi) (replace
> by python(abi) if you wish) virtual provide? Especially, why Ruby
> packaging guidelines mandate "Requires: ruby(abi) = 1.9.1", i.e.
> versioned require? And why in Python packages, python(abi) is
> automatically generated?

In the python case, it's because that python extension modules
install in a version-specific directory ($libdir/python2.7, for example.)
This makes them explicitly tied to that version of python.

Bill