GIL in the new glossary

[John J. Lee]

lcaamano at mindspring.com (Luis P Caamano) writes:

> jjl at pobox.com (John J. Lee) wrote in message news:<87smmbyvm7.fsf at pobox.com>...
> > дамјан г. <mk at net.mail.penguinista> writes:
> > [...]
> > > Seriously, the biggest problem with GIL is in applications like mod_python,
> > > which is an Python extension to Apache. When Apache works in the
> > > multithreaded MPM (I think it was called "Worker") the GIL starts to be a
> > > serious bottleneck in your server performance. The GIL will lock your
> > > Apache threads if they happen to hit on a mod_python handled location.
> > 
> > But doesn't Apache also have a multi-process mode?
> > 
> > If not, why not use a different web server if this becomes a problem?
> 
> Oh, so this is Apache's problem?  What kind of logic
> is that? 

Pragmatic logic?  Seriously, what do you mean?  I don't think it's
Apache's problem or Python's problem, it's just a situation that
involves both Apache and Python.  No great fault involved on either
side, as far as I can see <shrug>.

Before we get into any debate about Apache in particular, I should
stress I really don't know what the situation is in that particular
case.  I seem to vaguely remember that Apache has more than one
process model, so presumably you have the process / thread choice
(though I guess processes are less attractive on Windows -- another
good reason to avoid Windows :-).  I know that sometimes the GIL is
released, but dunno whether that has relevance for mod_python or any
of the other bits of Python web framework that like to work with
Apache.  That's about the sum total of my knowledge here, so not much
point in continuing...


John