Mysterious EOFError

[Steven D'Aprano]

On Sat, 08 Apr 2006 23:07:54 -0700, Rex Eastbourne wrote:

> Hi,
> 
> I'm executing a python script as a cron job. When I run it myself from
> the command line it works, but when cron executes it I get an EOFError:
> 
> File "/home/rex/cronscript.py", line 6, in ?
>     level = int(raw_input("hello?"))
> EOFError: EOF when reading a line


Because raw_input is waiting for input from the user. I assume that when
cron runs a Python script, and there is no actual human user to enter a
string in response to raw_input, it raises a EOF error.

Written in the docs:

http://docs.python.org/lib/module-exceptions.html


exception EOFError
    Raised when one of the built-in functions (input() or raw_input())
    hits an end-of-file condition (EOF) without reading any data. (N.B.:
    the read() and readline() methods of file objects return an empty
    string when they hit EOF.)


-- 
Steven.