[Python-Dev] stdlib socket usage and "keepalive"

[Guido van Rossum]

On Mon, Apr 12, 2010 at 3:59 PM, Daniel Stutzbach
<daniel at stutzbachenterprises.com> wrote:
> On Mon, Apr 12, 2010 at 5:34 PM, Jesus Cea <jcea at jcea.es> wrote:
>>
>> The problem is: linux doesn't uses KEEPALIVE by default.
>
> If you believe the problem is with the Linux kernel, perhaps you should take
> up your case on a more appropriate mailing list?
>
> Python's socket module is a fairly low-level module, as it's just a thin
> wrapper around the corresponding operating system calls.  Anyone using it
> has to be prepared to deal with a certain amount of exposed operating system
> details.

Bingo. I expect that changing this will have too many unanticipated
ramifications to be safe.

> If you want to use TCP KEEPALIVE on Linux, then just call:
>     my_socket_object.setsockopt(socket.SOL_SOCKET, socket.SO_KEEPALIVE, 1)
>
> Most non-trivial applications use select() or poll() to avoid blocking calls
> and do their own timeout-checking at the application layer, so they don't
> need KEEPALIVE.

> --
> Daniel Stutzbach, Ph.D.
> President, Stutzbach Enterprises, LLC

-- 
--Guido van Rossum (python.org/~guido)