I am trying to return values from subprocesses but these values are unfortunately unpicklable. So I used global variables in threads module with success but have not been able to retrieve updates done in subprocesses when using multiprocessing module. I hope I'm missing something.

The results printed at the end are always the same as initial values given the vars dataDV03 and dataDV04. The subprocesses are updating these global variables but these global variables remain unchanged in the parent.

import multiprocessing

# NOT ABLE to get python to return values in passed variables.

ants = ['DV03', 'DV04']
dataDV03 = ['', '']
dataDV04 = {'driver': '', 'status': ''}


def getDV03CclDrivers(lib):  # call global variable
    global dataDV03
    dataDV03[1] = 1
    dataDV03[0] = 0
# eval( 'CCL.' + lib + '.' +  lib + '( "DV03" )' ) these are unpicklable instantiations

def getDV04CclDrivers(lib, dataDV04):   # pass global variable
    dataDV04['driver'] = 0  # eval( 'CCL.' + lib + '.' +  lib + '( "DV04" )' )


if __name__ == "__main__":

    jobs = []
    if 'DV03' in ants:
        j = multiprocessing.Process(target=getDV03CclDrivers, args=('LORR',))
        jobs.append(j)

    if 'DV04' in ants:
        j = multiprocessing.Process(target=getDV04CclDrivers, args=('LORR', dataDV04))
        jobs.append(j)

    for j in jobs:
        j.start()

    for j in jobs:
        j.join()

    print 'Results:\n'
    print 'DV03', dataDV03
    print 'DV04', dataDV04

I cannot post to my question so will try to edit the original.

Here is the object that is not picklable:

In [1]: from CCL import LORR
In [2]: lorr=LORR.LORR('DV20', None)
In [3]: lorr
Out[3]: <CCL.LORR.LORR instance at 0x94b188c>

This is the error returned when I use a multiprocessing.Pool to return the instance back to the parent:

Thread getCcl (('DV20', 'LORR'),)
Process PoolWorker-1:
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "/alma/ACS-10.1/casa/lib/python2.6/multiprocessing/process.py", line 232, in _bootstrap
self.run()
File "/alma/ACS-10.1/casa/lib/python2.6/multiprocessing/process.py", line 88, in run
self._target(*self._args, **self._kwargs)
File "/alma/ACS-10.1/casa/lib/python2.6/multiprocessing/pool.py", line 71, in worker
put((job, i, result))
File "/alma/ACS-10.1/casa/lib/python2.6/multiprocessing/queues.py", line 366, in put
return send(obj)
UnpickleableError: Cannot pickle <type 'thread.lock'> objects



In [5]: dir(lorr)
Out[5]:
['GET_AMBIENT_TEMPERATURE',
 'GET_CAN_ERROR',
 'GET_CAN_ERROR_COUNT',
 'GET_CHANNEL_NUMBER',
 'GET_COUNT_PER_C_OP',
 'GET_COUNT_REMAINING_OP',
 'GET_DCM_LOCKED',
 'GET_EFC_125_MHZ',
 'GET_EFC_COMB_LINE_PLL',
 'GET_ERROR_CODE_LAST_CAN_ERROR',
 'GET_INTERNAL_SLAVE_ERROR_CODE',
 'GET_MAGNITUDE_CELSIUS_OP',
 'GET_MAJOR_REV_LEVEL',
 'GET_MINOR_REV_LEVEL',
 'GET_MODULE_CODES_CDAY',
 'GET_MODULE_CODES_CMONTH',
 'GET_MODULE_CODES_DIG1',
 'GET_MODULE_CODES_DIG2',
 'GET_MODULE_CODES_DIG4',
 'GET_MODULE_CODES_DIG6',
 'GET_MODULE_CODES_SERIAL',
 'GET_MODULE_CODES_VERSION_MAJOR',
 'GET_MODULE_CODES_VERSION_MINOR',
 'GET_MODULE_CODES_YEAR',
 'GET_NODE_ADDRESS',
 'GET_OPTICAL_POWER_OFF',
 'GET_OUTPUT_125MHZ_LOCKED',
 'GET_OUTPUT_2GHZ_LOCKED',
 'GET_PATCH_LEVEL',
 'GET_POWER_SUPPLY_12V_NOT_OK',
 'GET_POWER_SUPPLY_15V_NOT_OK',
 'GET_PROTOCOL_MAJOR_REV_LEVEL',
 'GET_PROTOCOL_MINOR_REV_LEVEL',
 'GET_PROTOCOL_PATCH_LEVEL',
 'GET_PROTOCOL_REV_LEVEL',
 'GET_PWR_125_MHZ',
 'GET_PWR_25_MHZ',
 'GET_PWR_2_GHZ',
 'GET_READ_MODULE_CODES',
 'GET_RX_OPT_PWR',
 'GET_SERIAL_NUMBER',
 'GET_SIGN_OP',
 'GET_STATUS',
 'GET_SW_REV_LEVEL',
 'GET_TE_LENGTH',
 'GET_TE_LONG_FLAG_SET',
 'GET_TE_OFFSET_COUNTER',
 'GET_TE_SHORT_FLAG_SET',
 'GET_TRANS_NUM',
 'GET_VDC_12',
 'GET_VDC_15',
 'GET_VDC_7',
 'GET_VDC_MINUS_7',
 'SET_CLEAR_FLAGS',
 'SET_FPGA_LOGIC_RESET',
 'SET_RESET_AMBSI',
 'SET_RESET_DEVICE',
 'SET_RESYNC_TE',
 'STATUS',
 '_HardwareDevice__componentName',
 '_HardwareDevice__hw',
 '_HardwareDevice__stickyFlag',
 '_LORRBase__logger',
 '__del__',
 '__doc__',
 '__init__',
 '__module__',
 '_devices',
 'clearDeviceCommunicationErrorAlarm',
 'getControlList',
 'getDeviceCommunicationErrorCounter',
 'getErrorMessage',
 'getHwState',
 'getInternalSlaveCanErrorMsg',
 'getLastCanErrorMsg',
 'getMonitorList',
 'hwConfigure',
 'hwDiagnostic',
 'hwInitialize',
 'hwOperational',
 'hwSimulation',
 'hwStart',
 'hwStop',
 'inErrorState',
 'isMonitoring',
 'isSimulated']

In [6]: