Can multiprocessing.Process() use a different version of the interpreter?

[Robert Kern]

On 10/4/10 11:39 AM, Scott Pigman wrote:
> I want to use the 64 bit version of python but run some code inside a
> spawned process that uses the 32 bit version.  Is there an official
> way to do this, or can anybody make a recommendation about the
> cleanest way to do this? If someone has a better solution to the
> problem I describe below, I'd appreciate hearing that too. I'm using
> python 2.7, but could go to 3.x if that has better support for this.
>
> My program interacts with two different commercial libraries by using
> ctypes to execute functions inside their DLLs.  One library only
> exists in a 32 bit version.  The second library has both 64 and 32 bit
> versions.  The code was initially developed for a 32 bit platform, but
> now I need to support a user on a 64 bit machine as well.  I've
> learned that ctypes can only interact with libraries which match the
> version of python that is running --- 32 bit python can use 32 bit
> DLLs, 64 bit python can use 64 bit DLLs, so when I'm running on a 64
> bit machine with one 64 bit library and the other at 32 bits, I can't
> use the 32 bit library.
>
> I believe that the solution is to have both win32 and x64 versions of
> python installed, and then execute the win32 code inside of a new
> process which uses the win32 version of Python.  I'm already using
> multiprocessing to run that code inside a new process because the two
> libraries have conflicts and need to run in separate memory space.  If
> I could just specify that I want the new process to use a different
> version of the interpreter I think I'd be all set, but I don't see a
> way of doing that.

You cannot use a Process() to do this, but you should be able to use Managers or 
the other tools in the multiprocessing packages for communicating between the 
processes.

http://docs.python.org/library/multiprocessing#module-multiprocessing.managers

There may be hidden assumptions in the code, though. I've never tried it myself.

-- 
Robert Kern

"I have come to believe that the whole world is an enigma, a harmless enigma
  that is made terrible by our own mad attempt to interpret it as though it had
  an underlying truth."
   -- Umberto Eco