[gdal-dev] Python bindings: aliasing gdal.Open and gdal.OpenEx

[Vincent Schut]

On 2026-06-17 1:49 pm, Even Rouault via gdal-dev wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I'd like to have a broader feedback of the community on 
> https://github.com/OSGeo/gdal/pull/14763 . Please read it in detail. 
> In practice, the main backwards incompatibility would be the point 1 I 
> mention in the PR text, that is that for current users of 
> gdal.Open(dsname), they would now get vector datasets opened in 
> addition to raster ones. While I see this is as a long term benefit, 
> at least one user (https://github.com/ubarsc/rios/pull/192) had to 
> work around it since they expected gdal.Open() to fail on vector 
> datasets. The workaround being to use gdal.OpenEx(dsname, 
> gdal.OF_RASTER) that will work before and after the PR,  or if 
> targeting only post PR state, gdal.Open(dsname, gdal.OF_RASTER)
>
> PR 14763 would be potential material for a GDAL 4 if that did occur, 
> but I don't know if it is desirable and even if it was, I don't think 
> it would happen in a short or medium term (mostly because the GDAL dev 
> community is too small to be able to gather a significant set of 
> backwards incompatible change in a reasonable period of time, while 
> not blocking features to be released at a reasonable frequency). So 
> we're more in a situation where we land a few backwards incompatible 
> change each (non bugfix) release.
>
> Even
>
Hi Even,

(I doubted whether to reply because it was a bit unclear to me if you 
only wanted people with concerns to reply, or also people who don't see 
any issue with the proposed change.)

We (as quite heavy users of gdal in our internal python software) do not 
see any issues with this proposal for us, and would in fact welcome this 
change because it will reduce ambiguity between the 2 possible ways to 
open raster datasets.

Thanks for asking feedback,
Vincent.
-- 

	

Vincent Schut

Remote Sensing Software Engineer

+31 302272679 ~ Maliebaan 22 | 3581CP | Utrecht | Netherlands

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