POLL in different OSes

[brueckd at tbye.com]

On 23 Oct 2001, Donn Cave wrote:

> I would rather discourage people from using poll in python, since select
> appears to work everywhere poll does, but not vice versa.  Seems like
> speed of one vs. the other would be irrelevant in the context of a
> Python program.

Hmm, no. The reasons why poll support was added to Linux, FreeBSD, etc.
are the same reasons why poll support is nice to have in Python (handles
more concurrent connections, more efficient, etc.). Put another way: many
servers are I/O and not CPU bound, so if something benefits I/O in a C
server then it has a good chance of benefiting a Python version of the
same thing, and poll vs. select just happens to be one of those things.

-Dave