SmartProcess

Extension to multiprocessing.Process with multiple memory-management options, the ability to return results from processes, and more.

This is a relatively low-level part of SmartMultiprocessing. Average users are probably more interested in more abstract parts of this library, like SmartPool and SmartQueue, which can initialise as many SmartProcesses as you'd like and include GUI options.

The API of SmartProcess matches that of multiprocessing.Process, except with some notable additions like:

SmartProcess.resource_usage() - get the process' current CPU and memory usage.

SmartProcess.is_finished() - boolean for if process is done.

SmartProcess.get_result() - get the result from target, if process finished.

SmartProcess.get_children() - get all child processes of this process.

__init__(group=None, target=None, name=None, args=(), kwargs={}, daemon=None, fetch_result=False)

Create a new SmartProcess object.

Parameters:

Name	Type	Description	Default
group	None	Argument that must always be None. It exists for compatibility with the threading.Thread API.	None
target	Callable	Target function to run on.	None
name	str	Name of process to pass to multiprocessing.Process.	None
args	Iterable[Any]	Arguments to pass to target.	()
kwargs	Mappable[str, Any]	Keyword arguments to pass to target.	{}
daemon	None or bool	Whether or not to run as a daemon (background process). Passed to multiprocessing.Process. TODO: not sure if this can actually be supported...	None
fetch_result	bool	Whether or not to try and fetch a result in-memory for target. target must return a value for this to be used.	False

Notes

CPU and memory usage tracking is done using psutil. Support on systems that aren't Linux, Mac, or Windows may be limited.

Examples:

Start a process that prints to the console in the background:

>>> p = smartmultiprocessing.SmartProcess(target=lambda: print("Hello World"))
>>> p.start()
Hello World

We can check if the process is finished:

>>> p.is_finished()
True

or get its exitcode:

>>> p.get_exitcode()
0

get_children(recursive=True)

Gets the children of the process. TODO: document params

memory_usage(children=False)

Returns current memory usage of the process.. TODO: document params

cpu_usage(interval=None, children=False)

Returns current CPU usage of the process.. TODO: document params

resource_usage(interval=None, children=False)

get_result(join=False, timeout=None, pipe_timeout=1.0)

Attempts to fetch a result for the process. TODO: document params

get_exitcode()

Returns the exitcode of the process, which is only set if it has finished.

run()

Runs the target of the process.

Not recommended: use SmartProcess.start() instead.

start()

Starts the process.

join(timeout=None)

Joins the thread of the process (assuming it has been started already) and blocks until completion.

is_alive()

Boolean of whether or not the process is currently running.

is_finished()

Boolean of whether or not the process has finished.

terminate(children=True)

Sends a SIGTERM and terminates the process. TODO: document params

kill(children=True)

Sends a SIGKILL and kills the process. TODO: document params

close()

Closes all resources occupied by the process.