From: Fernando Arbeiza <arbeizaf@...>
Date: 2003-02-16T12:42:16+09:00
Subject: killing a thread and its child

Hi!

Perhaps this is more of a unix programming question but, since I am only
a newbie (in linux and ruby), I cannot think of a more satisfactory
method.

My question is: How would you kill a ruby thread and its child? I am
creating a ruby thread, and then using the Kernel.system method to call
an external program. But then, if I kill the thread, the external
program keeps running. I have ended up with some code like this:

######## Begin of code ########
class Player < Thread
    attr_accessor( :child )
    def initialize
        @child = Array.new
        super
    end
    def kill_tree
        @child.each do |process|
            Process.kill('KILL', process)
        end
        kill
    end
end

# Test program
player = Player.new do
    process = fork
    if process.nil?
        exec('while true; do echo "hi!"; sleep 1; done;')
    end
    Thread.current.child << process
    sleep(10)
    puts('bye, parent!')
end

sleep(5)
player.kill_tree
puts('bye!')
######## End of code ########

How would you achieve the same?

Thanks in advance,
-- 
Fernando Arbeiza        <URL: mailto:arbeizaf@ono.com>
Crea tu propio Linux:   <URL: http://www.escomposlinux.org/lfs-es>