[Draft] Remove distutils

Distutils is gone in Python 3.12+.

README.md

@@ -91,8 +91,8 @@ Now, `cmake --version` should be at version 3.20.0 or newer.
 
 Or go:
 ```bash
-# optional:                                    --user
-python3 -m pip install -U pip setuptools wheel
+python3 -m pip install -U pip
+python3 -m pip install -U build packaging setuptools wheel
 python3 -m pip install -U cmake
 ```
 

pyproject.toml

@@ -2,6 +2,7 @@
 requires = [
     "setuptools>=42",
     "wheel",
-    "cmake>=3.20.0,<4.0.0"
+    "cmake>=3.20.0,<4.0.0",
+    "packaging>=23",
 ]
 build-backend = "setuptools.build_meta"

setup.py

@@ -7,7 +7,6 @@
 #
 from distutils.command.build import build
 from distutils.command.clean import clean
-from distutils.version import LooseVersion
 import os
 import platform
 import re
@@ -54,6 +53,8 @@ def __init__(self, name, sourcedir=""):
 
 class CMakeBuild(build_ext):
     def run(self):
+        from packaging.version import parse
+
         try:
             out = subprocess.check_output(["cmake", "--version"])
         except OSError:
@@ -63,10 +64,10 @@ def run(self):
                 + ", ".join(e.name for e in self.extensions)
             )
 
-        cmake_version = LooseVersion(
+        cmake_version = parse(
             re.search(r"version\s*([\d.]+)", out.decode()).group(1)
         )
-        if cmake_version < "3.20.0":
+        if cmake_version < parse("3.20.0"):
             raise RuntimeError("CMake >= 3.20.0 is required")
 
         for ext in self.extensions: