continuous-threading 1.0.4

Library to help manage threads that run continuously for a long time.

# continuous_threading

-----------------------

This library provides several classes to help manage threads that run continuously.

There are some problems with threads runing continuously in a loop. Calculation threads are greedy and keep running
which starves other threads. Another problem is if you don't exit an infinite loop in a thread it may keep running
after python has tried to exit. Daemon threads will close, but resources/variables may not be cleaned up properly.
Mostly, I needed to finish writing data to a file before the thread closed. This library aims to solve those problems.

This library provides 4 main thread utilities:
* Thread - threading with context manager support
* ContinuousThread - Run a function continuously in a loop (It is suggested sleep is called periodically if no I/O)
* PausableThread - Continuous thread that can be stopped and started again.
* OperationThread - Thread that will run a calculation in a separate thread with different data.
* PeriodicThread - Thread that runs a function periodically at a given interval.


## Thread context manager
This library turns threads into a context manager which automatically starts and stops threads.

```python
import continuous_threading

thread_success = [False]

def do_something():
print('here')
thread_success[0] = True


with continuous_threading.Thread(target=do_something):
print('in context')

assert thread_success[0] is True
```

## ContinuousThread
The ContinuousThread is a simple thread in an infinite while loop. The while loop keeps looping while the thread
alive Event is set. Call `thread.stop()`, `thread.close()`, or `thread.join()` to stop the thread. The thread should
also stop automatically when the python program is exiting/closing.

```python
import continuous_threading

class CountingThread(continuous_threading.ContinuousThread):
def __init__(self):
super().__init__()
self.counter = 0

def _run(self):
self.counter += 1


with CountingThread() as th:
print('in context')

assert th.counter > 0
print("Simple context manager print caused %d thread iterations" % th.counter)
```

Example of start and stop methods.
```python
import time
import continuous_threading

class CountingThread(continuous_threading.ContinuousThread):
def __init__(self):
super().__init__()
self.counter = 0

def _run(self):
self.counter += 1

th = CountingThread()
th.start()
time.sleep(0.1)
th.stop() # or th.close() or th.join()

assert th.counter > 0
print("Simple context manager print caused %d thread iterations" % th.counter)
```

## PausableThread
A continuous thread that can be stopped and started again.

```python
import time
import continuous_threading


counter = [0]

def inc_counter():
counter[0] += 1

th = continuous_threading.PausableThread(target=inc_counter)

th.start()
time.sleep(0.1)

th.stop()
time.sleep(0.1)

value = counter[0]
assert value > 0

time.sleep(0.1)
assert value == counter[0]

th.start()
time.sleep(0.1)
assert counter[0] > value
```

Again this can be used as a context manager.
```python
import time
import continuous_threading

class CountingThread(continuous_threading.PausableThread):
def __init__(self):
super().__init__()
self.counter = 0

def _run(self):
self.counter += 1

with CountingThread() as th:
time.sleep(0.1)
th.stop()
value = th.counter
assert value > 0

time.sleep(0.1)
assert value == th.counter

th.start()
time.sleep(0.1)
assert th.counter > value
```

## OperationThread
Add data to a queue which will be operated on in a separate thread.

```python
import time
import continuous_threading


values = []

def run_calculation(data1, data2):
values.append(data1 + data2)

th = continuous_threading.OperationThread(target=run_calculation)
th.start()
th.add_data(1, 1)
time.sleep(0.1)

assert len(values) > 0
assert values[0] == 2

th.add_data(2, 2)
th.add_data(3, 3)
th.add_data(4, 4)
th.add_data(5, 5)

time.sleep(0.1)
assert values == [2, 4, 6, 8, 10]
```

## PeriodicThread

Run a function periodically.

```python
import time
import continuous_threading


time_list = []

def save_time():
time_list.append(time.time())

th = continuous_threading.PeriodicThread(0.5, save_time)
th.start()

time.sleep(4)
th.join()

print(time_list)
```