I have a test harness (written in Python) that needs to shut down the program under test (written in C) by sending it ^C. On Unix,
proc.send_signal(signal.SIGINT)
works perfectly. On Windows, that throws an error ("signal 2 is not supported" or something like that). I am using Python 2.7 for Windows, so I have the impression that I should be able to do instead
proc.send_signal(signal.CTRL_C_EVENT)
but this doesn't do anything at all. What do I have to do? This is the code that creates the subprocess:
# Windows needs an extra argument passed to subprocess.Popen,
# but the constant isn't defined on Unix.
try: kwargs['creationflags'] = subprocess.CREATE_NEW_PROCESS_GROUP
except AttributeError: pass
proc = subprocess.Popen(argv,
stdin=open(os.path.devnull, "r"),
stdout=subprocess.PIPE,
stderr=subprocess.PIPE,
**kwargs)
There is a solution by using a wrapper (as described in the link Vinay provided) which is started in a new console window with the Windows start command.
Code of the wrapper:
#wrapper.py
import subprocess, time, signal, sys, os
def signal_handler(signal, frame):
time.sleep(1)
print 'Ctrl+C received in wrapper.py'
signal.signal(signal.SIGINT, signal_handler)
print "wrapper.py started"
subprocess.Popen("python demo.py")
time.sleep(3) #Replace with your IPC code here, which waits on a fire CTRL-C request
os.kill(signal.CTRL_C_EVENT, 0)
Code of the program catching CTRL-C:
#demo.py
import signal, sys, time
def signal_handler(signal, frame):
print 'Ctrl+C received in demo.py'
time.sleep(1)
sys.exit(0)
signal.signal(signal.SIGINT, signal_handler)
print 'demo.py started'
#signal.pause() # does not work under Windows
while(True):
time.sleep(1)
Launch the wrapper like e.g.:
PythonPrompt> import subprocess
PythonPrompt> subprocess.Popen("start python wrapper.py", shell=True)
You need to add some IPC code which allows you to control the wrapper firing the os.kill(signal.CTRL_C_EVENT, 0) command. I used sockets for this purpose in my application.
Explanation:
Preinformation
send_signal(CTRL_C_EVENT)
does not work because CTRL_C_EVENT
is only for os.kill
. [REF1]
os.kill(CTRL_C_EVENT)
sends the signal to all processes running in the current cmd window [REF2]
Popen(..., creationflags=CREATE_NEW_PROCESS_GROUP)
does not work because CTRL_C_EVENT
is ignored for process groups. [REF2]
This is a bug in the python documentation [REF3]
Implemented solution
- Let your program run in a different cmd window with the Windows shell command start.
- Add a CTRL-C request wrapper between your control application and the application which should get the CTRL-C signal. The wrapper will run in the same cmd window as the application which should get the CTRL-C signal.
- The wrapper will shutdown itself and the program which should get the CTRL-C signal by sending all processes in the cmd window the CTRL_C_EVENT.
- The control program should be able to request the wrapper to send the CTRL-C signal. This might be implemnted trough IPC means, e.g. sockets.
Helpful posts were:
I had to remove the http in front of the links because I'm a new user and are not allowed to post more than two links.
- http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/windowsgeneraldevelopmentissues/thread/dc9586ab-1ee8-41aa-a775-cf4828ac1239/#6589714f-12a7-447e-b214-27372f31ca11
- Can I send a ctrl-C (SIGINT) to an application on Windows?
- Sending SIGINT to a subprocess of python
- http://bugs.python.org/issue9524
- http://ss64.com/nt/start.html
- http://objectmix.com/python/387639-sending-cntrl-c.html#post1443948
Update: IPC based CTRL-C Wrapper
Here you can find a selfwritten python module providing a CTRL-C wrapping including a socket based IPC.
The syntax is quite similiar to the subprocess module.
Usage:
>>> import winctrlc
>>> p1 = winctrlc.Popen("python demo.py")
>>> p2 = winctrlc.Popen("python demo.py")
>>> p3 = winctrlc.Popen("python demo.py")
>>> p2.send_ctrl_c()
>>> p1.send_ctrl_c()
>>> p3.send_ctrl_c()
Code
import socket
import subprocess
import time
import random
import signal, os, sys
class Popen:
_port = random.randint(10000, 50000)
_connection = ''
def _start_ctrl_c_wrapper(self, cmd):
cmd_str = "start \"\" python winctrlc.py "+"\""+cmd+"\""+" "+str(self._port)
subprocess.Popen(cmd_str, shell=True)
def _create_connection(self):
self._connection = socket.socket(socket.AF_INET, socket.SOCK_STREAM)
self._connection.connect(('localhost', self._port))
def send_ctrl_c(self):
self._connection.send(Wrapper.TERMINATION_REQ)
self._connection.close()
def __init__(self, cmd):
self._start_ctrl_c_wrapper(cmd)
self._create_connection()
class Wrapper:
TERMINATION_REQ = "Terminate with CTRL-C"
def _create_connection(self, port):
s = socket.socket(socket.AF_INET, socket.SOCK_STREAM)
s.bind(('localhost', port))
s.listen(1)
conn, addr = s.accept()
return conn
def _wait_on_ctrl_c_request(self, conn):
while True:
data = conn.recv(1024)
if data == self.TERMINATION_REQ:
ctrl_c_received = True
break
else:
ctrl_c_received = False
return ctrl_c_received
def _cleanup_and_fire_ctrl_c(self, conn):
conn.close()
os.kill(signal.CTRL_C_EVENT, 0)
def _signal_handler(self, signal, frame):
time.sleep(1)
sys.exit(0)
def __init__(self, cmd, port):
signal.signal(signal.SIGINT, self._signal_handler)
subprocess.Popen(cmd)
conn = self._create_connection(port)
ctrl_c_req_received = self._wait_on_ctrl_c_request(conn)
if ctrl_c_req_received:
self._cleanup_and_fire_ctrl_c(conn)
else:
sys.exit(0)
if __name__ == "__main__":
command_string = sys.argv[1]
port_no = int(sys.argv[2])
Wrapper(command_string, port_no)
Try calling the GenerateConsoleCtrlEvent
function using ctypes
. As you are creating a new process group, the process group ID should be the same as the pid. So, something like
import ctypes
ctypes.windll.kernel32.GenerateConsoleCtrlEvent(0, proc.pid) # 0 => Ctrl-C
should work.
Update: You're right, I missed that part of the detail. Here's a post which suggests a possible solution, though it's a bit kludgy. More details are in this answer.
I have been trying this but for some reason ctrl+break works, and ctrl+c does not. So using os.kill(signal.CTRL_C_EVENT, 0)
fails, but doing os.kill(signal.CTRL_C_EVENT, 1)
works. I am told this has something to do with the create process owner being the only one that can pass a ctrl c? Does that make sense?
To clarify, while running fio manually in a command window it appears to be running as expected. Using the CTRL + BREAK breaks without storing the log as expected and CTRL + C finishes writing to the file also as expected. The problem appears to be in the signal for the CTRL_C_EVENT.
It almost appears to be a bug in Python but may rather be a bug in Windows. Also one other thing, I had a cygwin version running and sending the ctrl+c in python there worked as well, but then again we aren't really running native windows there.
example:
import subprocess, time, signal, sys, os
command = '"C:\\Program Files\\fio\\fio.exe" --rw=randrw --bs=1M --numjobs=8 --iodepth=64 --direct=1 ' \
'--sync=0 --ioengine=windowsaio --name=test --loops=10000 ' \
'--size=99901800 --rwmixwrite=100 --do_verify=0 --filename=I\\:\\test ' \
'--thread --output=C:\\output.txt'
def signal_handler(signal, frame):
time.sleep(1)
print 'Ctrl+C received in wrapper.py'
signal.signal(signal.SIGINT, signal_handler)
print 'command Starting'
subprocess.Popen(command)
print 'command started'
time.sleep(15)
print 'Timeout Completed'
os.kill(signal.CTRL_C_EVENT, 0)