Hi, I noticed that Python still uses the Windows registry to initialize sys.path, when the -E option is used. From my understanding, this option is mostly used by programs that are running an embedded version of python, and don't want it to be affected by global installations. Ignoring the registry, along with environment variables, seems to be the correct behavior in this case. I asked about this on the python-dev list (http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2010-June/100492.html) and was told to submit a patch for this if I wanted it fixed before the 2.7 release. I've included a patch for 2.7 and 3.2

Looks good to me. Adding the release manager to the nosy list.

Any chance of getting this into 2.7 final? This fix is important for embedding Python in Windows applications.

Is still an issue with importlib? At this point, I don't think this change can be made on 2.7 or 3.2.

I don't think importlib changed anything in that regard (since one of the goals was too keep compatibility with all the old behaviours). Indeed the patch probably needs to be retargetted for 3.5.

Steve, I've updated the pull request with the requested change. Please take a look.

 New changeset 676b105111e2399ed400cd13ab113f9aa891760d by Zackery Spytz in branch 'master': bpo-8901: Windows registry path is now ignored with the -E option (GH-18169) https://github.com/python/cpython/commit/676b105111e2399ed400cd13ab113f9aa891760d 

I'm 99% satisfied that this change is the right approach (rather than adding a new option), but we'll have to wait to hear from beta feedback I think. My main concern is users who pass -E on the command line to avoid environment variables, but are relying on a Python install and not an embedded version. But for a regular install it should still find all the (site) libraries, so I think it'll be fine in basically every case.