[Tutor] Reading in file and processing it in a thread

[Vicki Stanfield]

I am doing threading for the first time in Python. I need to read in and process a file recursively if a checkbox on my gui is checked (wxPython) and stop at the end of the file if it is not. I used to have an EVT handler which called the following code (I know it ain't pretty!):
 
------------
    def ReadInFile(self):        
        inputfile = self.filesel.GetFilename()
        input = open('C:/'+inputfile, 'r')
        tokens=""
        
        first_iteration = wx.TRUE
        #While not STOP_READ, iterate through lines in file
        while STOP_READ != wx.TRUE or first_iteration == wx.TRUE:
            for line in input.readlines():
                if len(line)>1:
                    first_iteration == wx.FALSE
                    tokens=line.split("|")

                    self.command = tokens[0][0]+tokens[0][1]
                    self.arguments = tokens[0].lstrip(tokens[0][0]+tokens[0][1]+" ")
                    print self.command
                    print self.arguments
                    self.ProcessCommand(self.command, self.arguments)
                    wx.GetApp().Yield()
                else:
                    input.close()
--------------------

Now I want to create a thread in which to run the looping so that the gui is (relatively) independent and a button on it can be used to toggle the STOP_READ flag. I think I need to yank most of the above code out and run it as a thread. I added this and can run the thread with it:

        #Test thread code
        thread2 = thread.start_new_thread(self.ThreadTest, ())

so I can make the new thread start. Do I want the open and close of the file in the new thread or should input be passed to the thread from outside? If it should be passed in, how do I convert input to a tuple? I have a lot of confusion on threads at this point, so I apoligize if this simple threading exercise should be obvious to me. The examples that I have seen via google haven't been close enough to help me.

Thanks,

vicki

"A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty." 
-- Winston Churchill