Re: [Bug-gnulib] addition: wait-process.h, wait-process.c

[Paul Eggert]

Bruno Haible <address@hidden> writes:

>   - Is this complicated subprocess killing round necessary at all?
>     IMO, the subprocess is killed anyway a short time after the main
>     process, simply because it produces output, and writing to a closed
>     pipe kills the writer process. So is it just bloat in sdiff, or
>     a flaw in the pipe*.c functions in GNU gettext?

Perhaps neither.  I was worried about the case where 'diff' is not
producing output, either because it's a big diff and is CPU-bound, or
perhaps because it's reading from a pipe or a device that is waiting
for something.

>   - sdiff.c also does a lot of other signal handling stuff. Is this
>     useful in general?

It might be useful for other sdiff-like applications,
i.e. applications that interact with the user and invoke subprograms.

The code is a bit tricky, though; it's not for everybody.