manhole
Manhole is in-process service that will accept unix domain socket connections and present thestacktraces for all threads and an interactive prompt.
Decision gist · record as of 2026-08-14
Yes, if you need in-process debugging on Unix/Linux production systems. The package is stable, has no dependencies, and solves a real problem—live inspection without stopping the process. The dormant maintenance is acceptable for a mature tool with a narrow, well-defined scope. Not suitable for Windows or when you cannot use Unix domain sockets.AI-flagged interpretation of the facts on this page — verify before relying
Before you install
- Requires Unix/POSIX OS (Linux, OS X); not available on Windows.
- Requires Python 3.8 or later.
- Low friction to install—pure Python wheel with no runtime dependencies.
License · maintenance · safety
BSD-2-Clause (permissive) — BSD-2-Clause is permissive; you may use, modify, and distribute this package with minimal restrictions, provided you retain the license notice.
last release 2024-07-04 (771 days) · last repo commit 2024-07-04 · 402 stars
0 known vulnerabilities (OSV.dev, 2026-08-14) · 1,116,619 downloads/mo, #4,350 on PyPI
Alternatives
Verify before relying
import manhole
manhole.install()
# Then connect via: socat - UNIX-CONNECT:/tmp/manhole-<pid>- Whether the 771-day dormancy affects compatibility with Python 3.12 or newer in practice beyond the stated support.
- Whether the known deadlock issue with file-handle verbose_destination on Python 3.4+ still manifests on current Python versions.
What it is and what it does
Manhole is a debugging tool that runs inside your Python process and listens on a Unix domain socket. When you connect to that socket, it verifies your credentials (same user or root), redirects your standard streams, dumps stacktraces for all threads, and drops you into an interactive Python REPL where you can inspect and modify the running process. It's designed for production debugging—you can activate it on demand via a signal, run it in a background thread, or trigger it from a signal handler, and it handles forking, gevent, and eventlet with appropriate configuration.
The package has no runtime dependencies and installs as a pure Python wheel. It supports Python 3.8 through 3.12 on CPython and PyPy. Maintenance is dormant but the codebase is stable; the last release fixed a Python 3.11 buffering issue and cleaned up Python 2 remnants.
Use it for
- Attach a live REPL to a running production service to inspect state or execute commands without stopping it.
- Dump stacktraces from all threads in a hung or slow process to diagnose deadlocks or performance issues.
- Trigger debugging on demand by sending a signal (e.g., SIGUSR1) to activate the manhole listener.
- Debug forking applications (e.g., uWSGI workers) where the manhole reinstalls itself after fork.
- Inspect and modify application state in gevent or eventlet async frameworks with oneshot or non-threaded modes.
Worth the install?
AI-flagged interpretation of the facts on this page. Verify before relying on it.
Yes, if you need in-process debugging on Unix/Linux production systems.
The package is stable, has no dependencies, and solves a real problem—live inspection without stopping the process. The dormant maintenance is acceptable for a mature tool with a narrow, well-defined scope. Not suitable for Windows or when you cannot use Unix domain sockets.
Install
manhole on PyPI
Before you install
Low friction to install—pure Python wheel with no runtime dependencies. Maintenance is dormant (771 days since last release), though the repository is not archived and the package is marked Production/Stable. Last commit was 2024-07-04.
Requires Unix/POSIX OS (Linux, OS X); not available on Windows. Requires Python 3.8 or later.
License in practice
BSD-2-Clause is permissive; you may use, modify, and distribute this package with minimal restrictions, provided you retain the license notice.
Quickstart
import manhole
manhole.install()
# Then connect via: socat - UNIX-CONNECT:/tmp/manhole-<pid>Verify before relying
- Whether the 771-day dormancy affects compatibility with Python 3.12 or newer in practice beyond the stated support.
- Whether the known deadlock issue with file-handle verbose_destination on Python 3.4+ still manifests on current Python versions.
Package facts
| License | BSD-2-Clause permissive |
| Python support | Supports the current Python release >=3.8 |
| Install friction | Low. Pure-Python wheel |
| Runtime dependencies | None |
| Maintenance | Dormant 771 days since the last release |
| Last repo commit | |
| First released | |
| Downloads | 1,116,619 / month, #4,350 on PyPI 30-day window, as of 2026-08-14 |
| Known vulnerabilities | None known OSV.dev, checked 2026-08-14 |
| Classifiers | Development Status :: 5 - Production/StableIntended Audience :: DevelopersLicense :: OSI Approved :: BSD LicenseOperating System :: POSIXOperating System :: UnixProgramming Language :: PythonProgramming Language :: Python :: 3Programming Language :: Python :: 3 :: OnlyProgramming Language :: Python :: 3.10Programming Language :: Python :: 3.11Programming Language :: Python :: 3.12Programming Language :: Python :: 3.8Programming Language :: Python :: 3.9Programming Language :: Python :: Implementation :: CPythonProgramming Language :: Python :: Implementation :: PyPyTopic :: Software Development :: DebuggersTopic :: System :: MonitoringTopic :: System :: NetworkingTopic :: Utilities |
Evidence: manhole-1.8.1-py3-none-any.whl
Tags
Let your AI agent find packages like this
Example. Real query, live index.
You found this page by searching. An agent finds it by wishing: SkillFed indexes 14,416 PyPI packages by what they can do, searchable in plain language.
wish › “in-process debugger unix socket”
- manholeManhole installs an in-process debugging service that listens on a…
- rpdbrpdb is a remote debugger that wraps Python's pdb and routes…
- remote-pdbExposes Python's debugger (pdb) over a TCP socket so you can connect…
Give your agent the search over MCP, or paste the wish link into any chat.
More Utilities packages
Converts domain names between Unicode and ASCII-compatible encoding (Punycode) according to IDNA 2008 and Unicode Technical Standard 46, with security validation and broader script coverage than the standard library.
Install it if you work with internationalized domain names, need to validate domains, or use HTTP clients that depend on it transitively.
Detects and normalizes text encoding from unknown or ambiguous sources, supporting all IANA character sets that Python's core library provides codecs for, with the ability to register custom codecs.
Setuptools is a Python build backend and package management tool that handles building, distributing, and installing Python packages, including support for C/C++ extension modules.
Pluggy provides a plugin system that lets you define hook specifications and register implementations to be called in sequence, enabling extensible Python applications without tight coupling.
Install it if you're building an extensible application or framework.
Pygments is a syntax highlighter that colorizes source code and text in over 500 languages and formats, outputting to HTML, LaTeX, RTF, SVG, images, or ANSI terminal sequences.
Install it if you need to display or transform source code.
Six provides utility functions to write Python code that runs on both Python 2.7 and Python 3.3+, smoothing over language differences between the two versions.
See also requests-unixsocket · pdb-attach · rpdb · uwsgitop · daemonize · requests-unixsocket2 · mozdebug · grpcio-channelz · pid · frida-tools