[Python-Dev] os.spawnv[e] and related constants

[Tim Peters]

[Skip Montanaro]
> The spawnv and spawnve functions in the os module look useful, but the
> lib manual documentation is rather sparse about their semantics,
> referring the reader to the VC++ Runtime Library for more info.

Gigabytes of MS docs (including all the VC docs) are available online for
free:

    http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/

Since the MS docs are copyrighted, we can't just copy them into our docs.

> ...
> I can guess about P_WAIT and P_NOWAIT, but the
> meanings of the others aren't obvious to a person without Windows
> experience.

They aren't obvious to anyone, and if you want to use the non-obvious ones,
there are reams of MS docs you should understand first:

<http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/vccore98/H
TML/_crt__spawn.2c_._wspawn_functions.asp>

How is Fred going to summarize all that (all of it is necessary in the
end!), without running afoul of copyright?

Alas, it can take a long time to learn how to find this stuff (the doc
collection is massive).  In general, the place to start for C library docs
is:

Visual Tools and Languages ->
Visual Studio 6.0 ->
Vlsual C and C++ 6.0 ->
Product Documentation ->
Visual C++ Programmer's Guide ->
Run-Time Library Reference