detecting socket in use on localhost

[Scott David Daniels]

Berends wrote:
> Wrote the code. Seems to be working just fine:
> 
> [code]
> def determineAvailablePort():
>     t = socket.socket(socket.AF_INET, socket.SOCK_STREAM)
>     t.setsockopt(socket.SOL_SOCKET, socket.SO_REUSEADDR, 1)
> 
>     # Set the first port to bind to, to the minimum port in the range.
>     prt = 16000
>     isConnected = False
>     while not isConnected:
>         try:
>             t.bind( (myInfo["host"], prt ) )
>             isConnected = True
>             t.close()
>             del t
>         except socket.error:
>             prt += 1
>             if prt > 16029:
>                 raise Exception
> 
>     return prt
> [/code]

You might want to hang on to the port, so that you don't get race 
conditions where you determine the port and then some other process
grabs it.

Something like:

def determineAvailablePort(host='localhost'):
     skt = socket.socket(socket.AF_INET, socket.SOCK_STREAM)
     skt.setsockopt(socket.SOL_SOCKET, socket.SO_REUSEADDR, 1)

     # Set the first port to bind to, to the minimum port in the range.
     for prt in range(16000, 16030):
         try:
             t.bind((host, prt))
         except socket.error:
	    pass
         else:
             return skt, prt
     raise Exception, 'No port in 16000:16030 available'

Where the caller uses the opened socket.