This breaks running against 8.x.

I have a plan suggestion for moving forward with compatibility:

• Revert the portion of this PR that uses the "new" names (push, pop) and continue to use the old names
• In CP 9.x, support old & new names (all of push, push_head, push_sorted, pop and pop_head)
• Once 8.x is dropped from the bundle, switch to using the new names (probably when CP 10.x goes into the bundle)
• In CP 10.x, drop the old names as they will no longer be needed

The 'price' of this is probably under 100 bytes of flash in the core (6 dict entries + 3 qstrs with 30 chars total)

How about keeping the new names in the Python version of TaskQueue, and adding aliases that map the old names to the new names? So the uses would be old names, but the primary definitions in Python would be new names. That will make future merges easier.

Another alternative is to adapt to either naming convention inside asyncio but I am not thrilled about it: https://gist.github.com/jepler/71f02ca767d75d5fa4dd40abf70655f9 -- it does present a merge burden because all the call sites change.

 asyncio/core.py  | 22 ++++++++++++++--------
 asyncio/event.py |  4 ++--
 asyncio/funcs.py |  2 +-
 asyncio/lock.py  |  6 +++---
 asyncio/task.py  |  4 ++--
 5 files changed, 22 insertions(+), 16 deletions(-)

I don't think the "provide both names in core" is much of a merge burden, it just looks like this:

diff --git a/extmod/moduasyncio.c b/extmod/moduasyncio.c
index ea81fbc310..2ba8efb1fe 100644
--- a/extmod/moduasyncio.c
+++ b/extmod/moduasyncio.c
@@ -160,6 +160,11 @@ STATIC const mp_rom_map_elem_t task_queue_locals_dict_table[] = {
     { MP_ROM_QSTR(MP_QSTR_push), MP_ROM_PTR(&task_queue_push_obj) },
     { MP_ROM_QSTR(MP_QSTR_pop), MP_ROM_PTR(&task_queue_pop_obj) },
     { MP_ROM_QSTR(MP_QSTR_remove), MP_ROM_PTR(&task_queue_remove_obj) },
+
+    // CIRCUITPYTHON: remove these after the bundle need not support 8.x
+    { MP_ROM_QSTR(MP_QSTR_push_head), MP_ROM_PTR(&task_queue_push_obj) },
+    { MP_ROM_QSTR(MP_QSTR_push_sorted), MP_ROM_PTR(&task_queue_push_obj) },
+    { MP_ROM_QSTR(MP_QSTR_pop_head), MP_ROM_PTR(&task_queue_pop_obj) },
 };
 STATIC MP_DEFINE_CONST_DICT(task_queue_locals_dict, task_queue_locals_dict_table);
 

Another alternative is to adapt to either naming convention inside asyncio but I am not thrilled about it: https://gist.github.com/jepler/71f02ca767d75d5fa4dd40abf70655f9 -- it does present a merge burden because all the call sites change.

I agree with your conclusion. I was suggesting leaving def push(...) in TaskQueue and then just adding push_sorted = push_head = push in the class. Adding the aliasing to each call site is not needed. Changing the callsites later is really easy.

oh, yes, I see what you mean. I agree, the new names could be adopted now in the bundled pure Python TaskQueue implementation.

This is now compatible with 8.x again, by using the old names