windows - Why does the Python 2.7 AMD 64 installer seem to run Python in 32 bit mode?

Question

I've installed Python 2.7 from the python-2.7.amd64.msi package from python.org. It installs and runs correctly, but seems to be in 32-bit mode, despite the fact that the installer was a 64 bit installer.

Python 2.7 (r27:82525, Jul  4 2010, 07:43:08) [MSC v.1500 64 bit (AMD64)] on win32
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>>> import sys, platform
>>> platform.architecture()
('64bit', 'WindowsPE')
>>> sys.maxint
2147483647

What can I do to install Python so that it actually runs in 64-bit mode?

Answer 1

See the discussion here. It's from 2.6.1, but it seems to still apply. I haven't seen evidence to the contrary anywhere, at least. The gist of the matter (quoted from that link) is:

This is by design. In their infinitive wisdom Microsoft has decided to make the 'long' C type always a 32 bit signed integer - even on 64bit systems. On most Unix systems a long is at least 32 bit but usually sizeof(ptr).