[threading] Add daemon argument to Timer

[awolokita]

BPO	30519
Nosy	@pitrou, @vstinner, @Mariatta, @awolokita
PRs	bpo-30519: Add daemon keyword to Timer class constructor #1878

^{Note: these values reflect the state of the issue at the time it was migrated and might not reflect the current state.}

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GitHub fields:

assignee = None
closed_at = <Date 2020-03-09.11:14:13.469>
created_at = <Date 2017-05-31.02:54:13.332>
labels = ['3.8', 'type-feature', 'library']
title = '[threading] Add daemon argument to Timer'
updated_at = <Date 2020-03-09.11:14:13.468>
user = 'https://github.com/awolokita'

bugs.python.org fields:

activity = <Date 2020-03-09.11:14:13.468>
actor = 'vstinner'
assignee = 'none'
closed = True
closed_date = <Date 2020-03-09.11:14:13.469>
closer = 'vstinner'
components = ['Library (Lib)']
creation = <Date 2017-05-31.02:54:13.332>
creator = 'awolokita'
dependencies = []
files = []
hgrepos = []
issue_num = 30519
keywords = []
message_count = 2.0
messages = ['294808', '363715']
nosy_count = 4.0
nosy_names = ['pitrou', 'vstinner', 'Mariatta', 'awolokita']
pr_nums = ['1878']
priority = 'normal'
resolution = 'rejected'
stage = 'resolved'
status = 'closed'
superseder = None
type = 'enhancement'
url = 'https://bugs.python.org/issue30519'
versions = ['Python 3.8']

[awolokita]

Currently in order to have daemonic Timer objects one must instantiate the class, set daemonic status through the property (Timer.daemon=True), and then start the Timer. It would be nice to have the ability to set the daemonic status of the Timer class during instantiation, similar to what is possible with the Thread superclass.

This is a trivial enhancement to implement: simply add the daemon keyword argument to the Timer constructor, defaulted to None, and pass it on to the Thread constructor in the call to super().__init__.

[vstinner]

Daemon threads are very fragile by design. I would prefer to not promote their usage. See for example bpo-39877 for a recent example. I would prefer to remove support for daemon threads, rather than adding more daemon threads!

I reject the issue.

Moreover, PR 1878 has been closed.