[linux] issue with files moved from/to watched path

[izimobil]

[linux] issue with files moved from/to watched path

[bigdrum]

+1 I have the same problems on my ubuntu laptop.

[senko]

The exception raised when the move is from outside the monitored directory to the monitored directory is because the inotify observer assumes there was a MOVE_FROM inotify event, and tries to get source path from it.

I've got a branch modifying the observer to use None sa the src_path in such cases, instead of raising an exception. I've issued a pull request for it: #49

The other issue, missing move events when files are moved OUTSIDE the monitored directories, is IMHO much harder to solve. The way the code works is by first caching the MOVE_FROM inotify event (as described above), and then acting when MOVE_TO inotify event occurs. Since the MOVE_TO event never occurs because the target directory is not monitored, the observer doesn't register that the move has happened.

[gorakhargosh]

I've merged the pull request into HEAD.

Cheers!

[gorakhargosh]

If the issue has been resolved for you, you may
close this issue. =)

[adam-p]

Have both sub-issues been fixed? Senko's comment made it sound as if moving files into a watched directory is fixed, but not moving files out of a watched directory. I'm interested in both cases...

Thanks for the great project, btw.

[senko]

I'm not sure that it CAN be fixed reliably. One hack would be to remember MOVE_FROM events, and for each check (after some delay) whether a corresponding MOVE_TO event happened. If not, it's an out move. But I don't especially like this solution, feels hackish (in a negative way) to me.

[matmas]

So PollingObserver is better in this regard than InotifyObserver. Maybe it will be good to have some SimpleInotifyObserver, that would handle moves as create/delete combos. PollingObserver is good enough for me, so from watchdog.observers.polling import PollingObserver as Observer does the trick for now

[blaxter]

With this zentyal@9bd7030 you will have events when you move files or directories outside the watched path.

The problem is that for directories (with recursive=True) there should be 'n' events, one per file inside it, that's not possible (afaik) because we don't know the destiny. So in the end this is only a partial workaround, and your application code must know about this issue when using InotifyObserver.

[tamland]

@blaxter that only works if the from/to pairs happens to be in the same buffer when read. Do a batch move inside a watched tree and it'll probably fire duplicate events.

[tamland]

I've made an attempt at implementing the much talked about buffer approach. Basically all events are delayed and move from/to pairs matched during this delay. It's not pretty but appears to work ok. Current delay is set to 0.5 seconds (can be changed in inotify_buffered.py). Checkout branch delayed-inotify

[tamland]

fixed