execv giving a Fatal Error (11)

[Steve Holden]

"Rajarshi Guha" <rxg218 at psu.edu> wrote in message
news:a541uu$l0e at r02n01.cac.psu.edu...
> Hi,
>   I have a small python script which uses PyGTK. In one of the call backs
> I do:
>
> os.execv('/usr/bin/emacs',[])
>
> But as a result I get:
>
> Fatal error (11).Segmentation fault
>
> This occurs even when I run a script that contains the os.exev(...) as the
> only command.
>
> Does anybody know why this happens? Is there any other way I can implement
> this?
>
Should that be

    os.execv('/usr/bin/emacs', ['emacs'])

perhaps. Long time since I used exec, but I seem to remember it needs a
first argument in args to stand for the program name. Indeed, in cygwin
under 2.2 I get:

 >>> os.execv("/usr/bin/ls", [])
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
ValueError: execv() arg 2 must not be empty

This is certainly more helpful than a segfault!

>>> os.execv("/usr/bin/ls", ['ls'])
BookProject  lib     mydatabase.fs       nonweb   sketch2.jpg  tm1.py
PyNet        mounts  mydatabase.fs.lock  rhubarb  test.cpp     tm1.pyc
bin          msqd    mydatabase.fs.tmp   share    tf           wiki

regards
 Steve
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