Zombie Threads (?)

[holger krekel]

James J. Besemer wrote:
> I'm using threads in Python on Linux.  It's a dynamic application so
> threads are freely created and eventually terminate.
> 
> When I run PS I notice that there are a number of threads with a Zombie
> status.
> 
> I know that with forked sub processes, the OS keeps the children around
> until the parent waits.  For Apps that use forking -- there's a hack
> where you insert an additional level of forking, so that the spawned
> children have no direct parent and are cleaned up automatically by the
> OS.
> 
> Is there an analogous trick with Python threading on Linux?  Or does
> Python do something to minimize the number of zombie threads.

you might be interested that the double-fork thing can be done
in python (on unix only i think):

http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/66012

regards,

    holger