You can use 2005 to build extensions for Python 2.5. I've done this with several extensions, both my own and others. I do not know if you can use it for Python 2.4, so I won't advise you on that. I thought Microsoft made its C/C++ compiler, version 7.1 (2003) freely available as a command line tool. If you can't find it on their site, ask around, I'm sure a lot of people have it. Probably you'll also find someone has put it up somewhere if you search on google. Try 2005 first and see what happens though.
-Sandra -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
