Python creating C threads

Question

I'm trying to create a C camera module that python can interact with. The way I envision it working is:

• Python callable C methods to setup the camera (eg set gain, set trigger, etc)
• a C thread is started somewhere polling/called back with frames, when a frame is received in the thread - it is sent to a socket.

Basically Python will call the C methods to which will pass messages to the C thread. I'll make it thread safe using C mutexes or semaphores to pass the control command over to the C thread.

The question is where do I start the C thread? Is it best to start it in the PyMODINIT_FUNC or should I have another function to start the thread which returns an object holding a reference to the C thread or is there a better simple way? I need something reasonable quick to implement.

Cheers. Mitch.

Answer 1

Ended up just starting the thread in a "start" function and storing the thread id in a static variable and stopping the thread in a "stop" method. Works fine, raises errors where appropriate - no issues.