I'm running openSUSE 13.2. I already had python 2.7.8 and python 3.4.x. I ran into a situation where a business server was running python 2.6. I wanted to make a virtualenv, but I need to install the specific version first. I couldn't find python 2.6 in yast and I wasn't getting any hits when I was search for stuff in zypper.
So I downloaded the tar ball from python's download page for python 2.6.6 and followed the directions in the readme
This worked, but it changed my default python interpreter in the process. I worked through that and now things are fine. But I might want to install a different python version in the future without having to worry about it changing my default interpreter. I'm pretty sure there's more I could do on my own, but I need to move on to something else and I'm wondering if anybody was some quick feedback on what I've done so far and what I should do in the future.
If you need to maintain distinct versions simultaneously, it's best to install each in its own tree. configure takes an optional --prefix=/path/to/installation/root argument.
At one site, we would install an add-on software package in something like /opt/local/x86_64-linux-gnu/python-2.6.6. Users who need this specific version can then add /opt/local/x86_64-linux-gnu/python-2.6.6/bin to their $PATH, or use virtualenv or GNU stow.