download timeout vs. socket timeout

[Gabriel Genellina]

En Sat, 10 Jan 2009 00:07:15 -0200, p. <ppetrick at gmail.com> escribió:

> i'm using urllib2 in python 2.4
>
> wondering how people typically deal with the case in which a download
> is too slow. setting the socket timeout only covers those cases where
> there is no response in the socket for whatever the timeout period is.
> what if, however, i'm getting bits back but want simply to bail out if
> the total time to download takes too long?
>
> i'm trying to avoid creating a whole other thread if possible?

You may use signal.alarm if it is available on your platform.
On Windows, using a separate thread for reading is the easiest option -  
unless you plan to download hundreds of files simultaneously.

-- 
Gabriel Genellina