I've been happily using Django and MySQL in development on an existing machine running OS X 10.4 Tiger, and have set up a similar environment in 10.5 Leopard on a new 64-bit MacBook, with a working MySQL and Python 2.6.4.

However, now I want them to communicate, easy_install MySQL-python gave ld warnings that the file is not of the required architecture, which led me to test my Python 2.4.6 install (from the Mac OS X disc image):

>>> import sys
>>> sys.maxint
2147483647

Ah. So my Python install appears to be 32-bit and (I think?) won't install MySQL-python for my 64-bit MySQL. There are lots of hacks out there for MySQL-python on OS X (mostly 1.2.2), but - after hours of reading - I'm pretty sure they won't fix this architecture mismatch. So I'm stuck because I can't decide whether to:

• give up, remove the 64-bit MySQL install (thorough methods, please?) and use the 32-bit MySQL disc image instead;
• re-install Python in 64-bit mode from the tarball,
  --with-universal archs-64-bit and --enable-universalsdk=
  as detailed in Python.org's 2.6 news.

So my questions for anyone who has encountered this issue are:

1. Is installing 64-bit Python on OS X 10.5 worth bothering with?
2. If so, (naive, lazy question!) how are the two required arguments combined?
3. If I just skip along in 32-bit (as on my working setup) what am I missing?

I'm after a hassle-free install that's easy to reproduce on other machines (possible student use) so I'd really welcome your opinions, please!