[ python-Bugs-1068268 ] subprocess is not EINTR-safe

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Bugs item #1068268, was opened at 2004-11-17 22:07
Message generated for change (Comment added) made by mpitt
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Category: Python Library
Group: Python 2.4
Status: Open
Resolution: None
Priority: 3
Private: No
Submitted By: Peter Åstrand (astrand)
Assigned to: Peter Åstrand (astrand)
Summary: subprocess is not EINTR-safe

Initial Comment:
The subprocess module is not safe for use with signals,
because it doesn't retry the system calls upon EINTR.
However, as far as I understand it, this is true for
most other Python modules as well, so it isn't obvious
that the subprocess needs to be fixed. 

The problem was first noticed by John P Speno. 

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Comment By: Martin Pitt (mpitt)
Date: 2007-03-14 23:36

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I updated Peter's original patch to 2.5+svn fixes and added proper tests
to test_subprocess.py. It works great now.

What do you think about this approach? Fixing it only in submodule feels a
bit strange, but then again, this is meant to be an easy to use
abstraction, and most of the people that were hit by this (according to
Google) encountered the problem in subprocess.

I don't see how to attach something here, so I attached the updated patch
to the Ubuntu bug (https://launchpad.net/bugs/87292):

  http://librarian.launchpad.net/6807594/subprocess-eintr-safety.patch

Thanks,

Martin

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Comment By: Martin Pitt (mpitt)
Date: 2007-02-26 13:15

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I just got two different Ubuntu bug reports about this problem as well,
and I'm unsure how to circumvent this at the application level.

  http://librarian.launchpad.net/6514580/Traceback.txt
  http://librarian.launchpad.net/6527195/Traceback.txt

(from https://launchpad.net/bugs/87292 and its duplicate)

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Comment By: Matt Johnston (mattjohnston)
Date: 2004-12-22 08:07

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I've hit this on a Solaris 9 box without explicitly using
signals. Using the DCOracle module, a seperate Oracle
process is executed. When this terminates, a SIGCHLD is sent
to the calling python process, which may be in the middle of
a select() in the communicate() call, causing EINTR. From
the output of truss (like strace), a sigchld handler doesn't
appear to be getting explicitly installed by the Oracle module.

SunOS 5.9 Generic_112233-01 sun4u sparc SUNW,Sun-Fire-280R

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Comment By: Peter Åstrand (astrand)
Date: 2004-11-17 22:15

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One way of testing subprocess for signal-safeness is to
insert these lines just after _cleanup():

import signal
signal.signal(signal.SIGALRM, lambda x,y: 1)
signal.alarm(1)
import time
time.sleep(0.99)

Then run test_subprocess.py. 

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