[Pytables-users] PyTables crashes when parsing attributes

[Anthony F. <af...@pr...>]

	I'm still trying to track down the errors I had earlier this week, but 
in the meantime, we've found a bigger one.  PyTables crashes when 
opening a file with an attribute of the root node with the value "0.". 
It can write attributes like that fine, but when it tries to read 
there's a crash.

	I've tracked the problem down to a bug in Python 2.6.4's cPickle 
module.  Until Python fixes the bug (it might be fixed already in 2.7, I 
don't know), would it make sense to add a parameter to shut off 
automatic depickling of attributes?

	Here's a history of my simple test:

$ ipython
In [1]: import tables

In [2]: fyle = tables.openFile("crash_test.h5",mode="a")

In [3]: fyle.root._v_attrs
Out[3]:
/._v_attrs (AttributeSet), 4 attributes:
    [CLASS := 'GROUP',
     PYTABLES_FORMAT_VERSION := '2.0',
     TITLE := '',
     VERSION := '1.0']

In [4]: fyle.root._v_attrs.trouble = "0."

In [5]: fyle.root._v_attrs
Out[5]:
/._v_attrs (AttributeSet), 5 attributes:
    [CLASS := 'GROUP',
     PYTABLES_FORMAT_VERSION := '2.0',
     TITLE := '',
     VERSION := '1.0',
     trouble := '0.']

In [6]: fyle.close()

In [7]:
Do you really want to exit ([y]/n)?

$ ipython
In [1]: import tables

In [2]: fyle = tables.openFile("crash_test.h5")
Segmentation fault (core dumped)

$ ipython
In [1]: import cPickle

In [2]: cPickle.loads("0.")
Segmentation fault (core dumped)