Kill all processes using a list of pid's in python?

Question

I have a list of strings which contains the pid's to certain processes which must be killed at a certain time.

pidList = ['1234', '1235', '1236']

How would one run through the list first casting all elements to int, then killing the process represented by that pid?

essentially doing this:

os.kill(int(pidList[0]), signal.SIGTERM)

os.kill(int(pidList[1]), signal.SIGTERM)

os.kill(int(pidList[2]), signal.SIGTERM)

A for loop would be my first guess. – squiguy Jul 01 '13 at 18:32 — squiguy, Jul 01 '13 at 18:32

score 3 · Accepted Answer · answered Jul 01 '13 at 18:32

3

Simply iterate over the pidlist

for proc_id in pidlist:
   os.kill(int(proc_id), signal.SIGTERM)

answered Jul 01 '13 at 18:32

Ashwini Chaudhary

worked like a charm, I am still new to python so being able to declare a variable on the fly `proc_id` isn't second nature to me yet – user2497792 Jul 01 '13 at 19:45

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Jul 01 '13 at 18:36

0

you can use list comprehension

[os.kill(int(pid), signal.SIGTERM) for pid in pidlist]

also map will work

map(lambda x: os.kill(int(x), signal.SIGTERM), pidlist)

answered Jul 01 '13 at 18:36

Ansuman Bebarta

3

Using a `list comprehension` or `map` for side-effect is not a good idea. – Ashwini Chaudhary Jul 01 '13 at 18:38
@AshwiniChaudhary: I don't understand when you say side-effect. Can you please explain? – Ansuman Bebarta Jul 01 '13 at 18:42
1

Run this thing in shell and you'll see that it leaves behind a list like `[None, None, ...]` in the memory, which is useless because you created a list in memory and never used it. – Ashwini Chaudhary Jul 01 '13 at 18:54
@AshwiniChaudhary: Thank you for the explanation. I got it now. But I don't think it as a bigger threat but I am not sure. – Ansuman Bebarta Jul 01 '13 at 19:01
1

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/5753597/is-it-pythonic-to-use-list-comprehensions-for-just-side-effects – Ashwini Chaudhary Jul 01 '13 at 19:06
@AshwiniChaudhary: Thanks for sharing the link. It is a problem then and anti pythonic also. – Ansuman Bebarta Jul 01 '13 at 19:11

2 Answers2