reactor.spawnProcess() handles file-not-found differently on different platforms

	TimAllen reported
Trac ID	trac#4184
Type	defect
Created	2009-12-22 02:52:23Z

In #3292, I wrote some RPM-building tests, and added some code to skip them if the rpmbuild command was not found:

def checkForRpmbuild():
    def skipTestIfError(result):
	out, err, code = result
	if code != 0 or not out.startswith("RPM version"):
	    raise SkipTest("rpmbuild must be present to test tap2rpm")

    d = utils.getProcessOutputAndValue("rpmbuild", ("--version",))
    d.addCallback(skipTestIfError)
    return d

On my Fedora workstation, this code worked fine - it found the installed rpmbuild binary, and the tests passed. On the various Ubuntu and Debian buildbots, this code worked fine - rpmbuild was not found, the process' return code was non-zero, and the tests were properly skipped. On the various Win32 buildbots, it broke horribly, with this traceback:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "c:\twistedbot2\WXP32-full2.5-scmikes-select\Twisted\twisted\scripts\test\test_tap2rpm.py", line 94, in setUp
    return self._checkForRpmbuild()
  File "c:\twistedbot2\WXP32-full2.5-scmikes-select\Twisted\twisted\scripts\test\test_tap2rpm.py", line 106, in _checkForRpmbuild
    d = utils.getProcessOutputAndValue("rpmbuild", ("--version",))
  File "c:\twistedbot2\WXP32-full2.5-scmikes-select\Twisted\twisted\internet\utils.py", line 169, in getProcessOutputAndValue
    reactor)
  File "c:\twistedbot2\WXP32-full2.5-scmikes-select\Twisted\twisted\internet\utils.py", line 25, in _callProtocolWithDeferred
    reactor.spawnProcess(p, executable, (executable,)+tuple(args), env, path)
  File "c:\twistedbot2\WXP32-full2.5-scmikes-select\Twisted\twisted\internet\posixbase.py", line 234, in spawnProcess
    return Process(self, processProtocol, executable, args, env, path)
  File "c:\twistedbot2\WXP32-full2.5-scmikes-select\Twisted\twisted\internet\_dumbwin32proc.py", line 181, in __init__
    raise OSError(pwte)
exceptions.OSError: (2, 'CreateProcess', 'The system cannot find the file specified.')

It seems that on POSIX, calling spawnProcess() with a bogus command results in the callback being called; on Win32 it results in the errback being called, a behaviour likely to catch many people by surprise.

The spawnProcess() docs do say "OSError is raised errno EAGAIN or ENOMEM if there are insufficient system resources to create a new process." so anyone who calls spawnProcess() without handling OSError is technically in the wrong, but in that case the documentation still needs to be updated.

Exarkun has pointed out #3815 which doesn't mention a traceback, but does involve process-creation on Win32 being annoyingly non-POSIX. If someone with a Win32 machine determines this ticket is actually the same problem as that ticket, feel free to mark this as a duplicate.

trac-id__4184 4184
type__defect defect
reporter__TimAllen TimAllen
priority__normal normal
milestone__ 
branch__ 
branch_author__ 
status__new new
resolution__None None
component__core core
keywords__ 
time__1261450343000000 1261450343000000
changetime__1261450343000000 1261450343000000
version__None None
owner__ 

Start with twisted/internet/posixbase.py and twisted/internet/_dumbwin32proc.py, then inspect twisted/scripts/test/test_tap2rpm.py and the spawnProcess documentation. Reproduce the missing-rpmbuild behavior on POSIX and Win32, and check issue #3815 for overlap. Done means the platform discrepancy is resolved or the documented behavior and affected test handling are made consistent.