What do I mean by that? shared drives.
Seriously, install python$ver plus dependenceies into /mnt/bin add it into your path. You now have a single source of (readonly optional) each binary version.
this means that you can have many versions of the same software all compiled in a different way. But because they are in the path, they can be transparently managed. Also it means that much of the config management is now in one place, making joining nodes super simple.