The issue is classified as LOW severity because it primarily affects performance and not security. There's no direct exploitation vector, though the impact on startup time and memory usage can be significant for large codebases.
Python's eager import behavior can lead to unnecessary loading of heavy libraries which affects startup time and memory usage. The introduction of lazy imports aims to address this issue but has faced challenges in implementation and community acceptance.
Affected Systems
- Python (all versions before 3.15)
Affected Versions: All versions before Python 3.15
Remediation
- Monitor official Python releases for the inclusion of lazy imports feature in version 3.15 or later.
- Review and refactor code to use workarounds such as deferred imports within functions where appropriate.
Stack Impact
This affects Python applications that suffer from long startup times due to unnecessary eager loading of libraries. Specific services impacted include those running large CLI tools, heavy data processing scripts, or systems with numerous import dependencies.