How to disable RTLD_NOW for Python 2.7.x dlopen() in Mac OS X Mavericks?

[Ned Deily]

In article <c9bc3283-e895-4d9f-a749-fc35497a875e at googlegroups.com>,
 tcwan99 at gmail.com wrote:
> I'm facing a problem with a 3rd party C/C++ Framework (dynamic library) on 
> Mac OS X which I'm trying to import into Python using ctypes. Unfortunately 
> OS X has deprecated a function which is called from the Framework and is no 
> longer available as of 10.8+ (Mtn. Lion, now updated to Mavericks). In 
> addition, there is no recent version of the 3rd party framework available and 
> it does not look like it's actively updated. (The 3rd party framework in 
> question is the Fantom framework/driver for the LEGO Mindstorms NXT/EV3).
> 
> Existing tools using the 3rd party framework runs ok, but attempting to 
> access it using ctypes fails with a Symbol not Found error when Python 2.7.x 
> attempts to dlopen() the library. I suspect it is due to the setting of 
> RTLD_NOW when opening the framework. I'd like to try to specify RTLD_LAZY 
> instead.
> 
> Unfortunately sys.setdlopenflags(0) does not appear to do anything. RTLD_NOW 
> is still set, which I presume overrides RTLD_LAZY if both flags were set. 
> I've tried this with both the Apple supplied python and the version from 
> MacPorts.
> 
> Enclosed is a snippet of the code and the Traceback. Is there a way to force 
> RTLD_NOW off?

I'm not very familiar with ctypes internals but it looks like 
sys.setdlopenflags is not intended to have an influence on ctypes; rather, it 
conditions the Python interpreter's use of dlopen to load shared Python 
modules.  For ctypes itself, it looks like it unconditionally sets RTLD_NOW 
when calling dlopen and probably with good reason:

http://hg.python.org/cpython/file/2.7/Modules/_ctypes/callproc.c#l1432

Sorry, I don't have a suggestion for you, assuming you want to just try to 
ignore the error, other than perhaps running an older version of OS X in a VM 
on 10.8.

-- 
 Ned Deily,
 nad at acm.org