In Python 3, it would be possible to implement the "n" flag for open(), as we call CreateFile directly. BTW, if it will be an additional flag to "open", let me correct myself: "n" is not a good character. Now I prefer "p" like personal, private,
Hi, # I'm not sure about netiquette here: # I decided to continue posting to the python-list without CCing to everyone. First of all, here's the prototype. It's a prototype and I know it's far from perfect, but it works for me (in production code) - however, I did not yet test it on Non-Windows. --------------------------------- #!/bin/env python # -*- coding: iso-8859-1 -*- """ File ftools.py: Useful tools for working with files. """ import os import os.path import time import shutil rmtree = shutil.rmtree move = shutil.move builtin_open = open if os.name != "nt": import fcntl def open(fname, mode="r", bufsize=None): """ Like the "open" built-in, but does not inherit to child processes. The code is using os.open and os.fdopen. On Windows, to avoid inheritance, os.O_NOINHERIT is used directly in the open call, thus it should be thread-safe. On other operating systems, fcntl with FD_CLOEXEC is used right after opening the file; however in a mutli-threaded program it may happen that another thread starts a child process in the fraction of a second between os.open and fcntl. Note: The bufsize argument is ignored (not yet implemented). """ flags = 0 if "r" in mode: flags += os.O_RDONLY elif "w" in mode: flags += os.O_RDWR + os.O_CREAT + os.O_TRUNC elif "a" in mode: flags += os.O_RDWR + os.O_CREAT + os.O_APPEND else: raise NotImplementedError ("mode=" + mode) if os.name == "nt": if "b" in mode: flags += os.O_BINARY else: flags += os.O_TEXT flags += os.O_NOINHERIT try: fd = os.open (fname, flags) if os.name != "nt": old = fcntl.fcntl(fd, fcntl.F_GETFD) fcntl.fcntl(fd, fcntl.F_SETFD, old | fcntl.FD_CLOEXEC) return os.fdopen (fd, mode) except OSError, x: raise IOError(x.errno, x.strerror, x.filename) def copyfile(src, dst): """ Copies a file - like shutil.copyfile, but the files are opened non-inheritable. Note: This prototype does not test _samefile like shutil.copyfile. """ fsrc = None fdst = None try: fsrc = open(src, "rb") fdst = open(dst, "wb") shutil.copyfileobj(fsrc, fdst) finally: if fdst: fdst.close() if fsrc: fsrc.close() ------------------------------------------------ """ blah blah: I googled around a bit, and it more and more seems to me that the Posix system has a serious design flaw, since it seems to be SO hard to write multi-threaded programs that also start child-processes. It's funny that right now Linus Torvalds himself seems to be aware of this problem and that the Linux kernel developers are discussing ways to solve it. Let's hope they find a way to get around it on the OS level. To me, the design of MS Windows looks better in the aspect of process-creation, handle inheritance and multi-threading... Anyway, it has its drawbacks, too. For example, I still cannot specify in a thread-safe way that a handle should be inherited to one child process but not to another - I would have to use a lock to synchronize it, which has its own problems, as Ross Cohen noted. The best solution at the OS level would be to explitly specify the handles/fds I want to be inherited in a "create child process" system call. BTW the Linux kernel developers face the same situation as we do: They could somehow implement a new system function like "open_noinherit", but there's a whole bunch of existing "standard code" that uses open and similar functions like socket(), accept() etc., and they don't want to change all these calls. So perhaps, for Python development, we just have to accept that the problem persists and that at this time a 100% solution just does not exist - and we should watch the discussion on http://lwn.net/Articles/237722/ to see how they solve it for Linux. """ That being said, I still think it's necessary for Python to provide a solution as good as possible. For example, in my production application, by consequently using the ftools module above, I could reduce the error rate dramatically: * With built-in open and shutil.copyfile: Several "Permission denied" and other errors a day * With ftools.open and ftools.copyfile: program running for a week or more without errors. There are still errors sometimes, and I suspect it has to do with the unintenional inheritance of socket handles (I did not dig into SocketServer.py, socket.py and socket.c to solve it). (However, the errors are so rare now that our clients think it's just errors in their network :-). Martin, you mentioned that for sockets, inheritance is not a problem unless accept(), recv() or select() is called in the child process (as far as I understood it). Though I am not an expert in socket programming at the C level, I doubt that you are right here. Apart from by own experiences, I've found some evidence in the WWW (searching for "child process socket inherit respond", and for "socket error 10054 process"). * http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/2003-November/236043.html "socket's strange behavior with subprocesses" Funny: Even notepad.exe is used there as an example child process... * http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-bugs-list/2006-April/032974.html python-Bugs-1469163 SimpleXMLRPCServer doesn't work anymore on Windows (see also Bug 1222790). * http://bugs.sun.com/bugdatabase/view_bug.do?bug_id=4202949 Java has switched to non-inheritable sockets as well. * http://bugs.sun.com/bugdatabase/view_bug.do?bug_id=5069989 "(process) Runtime.exec unnecessarily inherits open files (win)" * http://bugs.sun.com/bugdatabase/view_bug.do?bug_id=4197666" "Socket descriptors leak into processes spawned by Java programs on windows" ... Any Windows Guru around who can explain what's going on with socket handles and CreateProcess? I mean - is the explanation Martin gave for accept(), recv(), select() correct for Windows, too? And if so - how can the errors be explained that are mentioned in the URLs above? Martin v. Löwis wrote: protected, process.
And to open a file non-inheritable should be possible in an easy and platform-independent way for the average python programmer. I don't see why it is a requirement to *open* the file in non-inheritable mode. Why is not sufficient to *modify* an open file to have its handle non-inheritable in an easy and platform-independent way? Because it wouldn't be thread-safe, unless a lock is used for synchronizing subprocess and open calls, which would cause other issues.
Are you still reading? Here's a pragmatic proposal: - Add the functions in ftools.py (in a more complete version) to the standard library. Perhaps even add them to the subprocess.py module? - Add a note about handle inheritance to the documentation for the subprocess module, saying that for the parent process, one should avoid using open and prefer ftools.open instead. - Add a global switch to the socket module to choose between new and old behaviour: - New behaviour: In the C level socket implementation, use os.O_NOINHERIT resp. fcntl FD_CLOEXEC Remember: In case you write a forking socket server in Python, you have to use the old behaviour (so, in the ForkingServerMixin, expliticly choose the old behaviour). - Change the logging file handler classes to use ftools.open, so that at least the logging module does not produce errors in a multi-threaded program with child processes. - For Python 3000, search the standard library for unintentional inheritance. What do you think? Henning Footnote: I bet that about 50% of all unexplainable, seemingly random, hard-to-reproduce errors in any given program (written in any programming language) that uses child processes are caused by unintentional handle inheritance.