Get 2 isolated instances of a python module

I am interacting with a开发者_如何学JAVA python 2.x API written in a non-OO way, it uses module-global scope for some internal state driven stuff. It's needed in a context where it's no longer singleton, and modifying the original code (not ours) is not an option.

Short of using subprocess runs of separate interpreters, is there any way I could box off the modules and interact with multiple instances of the module (thus treating it as an object)?

I need to use the module to drive 2 different setups - which it doesn't internally seem to work with.

Disclaimer: Please don't do this. Please do this only if in a very odd situation - and try to alter the situation in other ways before doing this. I did this to cope with odd code that could not be changed at the time of asking - not to provide a way to proliferate more odd code.

Just remove the module from sys.modules:

>>> import sys
>>> import mod as m1
>>> m1.x = 1
>>> del sys.modules['mod']
>>> import mod as m2
>>> m2.x = 2
>>> m1.x
1

You can try by fooling sys.modules

import badmodule as badmod1

import sys
del sys.modules['badmodule']

import badmodule as badmod2

If this works or not of course depends on what the bad module is doing...

I haven't used it personally but it seems that Exocet library may help.

Easiest way is to make two copies of the module and import them separately. For example, take your module thingabobber and make two copies named thingabobber1 and thingabobber2. Then just:

import thingabobber1, thingabobber2

If this isn't feasible, delete the module from sys.modules after initially importing it so you get a second copy on the second import.

import sys

import thingabobber as thingabobber1
del sys.modules["thingabobber"]
import thingabobber as thingabobber2

This can be achieved by importing the module via different paths. That is - if in your sys.path you have two different dotted routes to the module, the module cache will create two different instances of the module with different symbol trees, globals and so on.

This can be used to have multiple versions of a library also.

Beware that it will lead to exceptions not being caught (as you are trying to catch the wrong symbol).

I was trying this with binary (so) submodules, but that procedure failed.