tested python 3.1.2

Man = multiprocessing.Manager();
d = man.dict();
d['l'] = list();
d['l'].append("hey");
print(d['l']);
>>> []

using debugger reveals a KeyError. Extend also does not work. Only thing that works is += which means you can't insert actual tuples or lists into the list. This was all done on a single process

Similarly:

>>> x = man.list()
>>> x.append({})
>>> x[0]
{}
>>> x[0]['a'] = 5
>>> x[0]
{}

Lots of fun!

Maybe surprising but not so weird if you think about what happens
behind the scenes.

When you do

    >>> x = man.list()
    >>> x.append({})

You send an empty dict to the manager to be appended to x

when do:

   >>> x[0]
   {}

you receive a local copy of the empty dict from the manager process.


So this:

    >>> x[0]["a"] = 5

will only modify the local copy.

What you would have to do is:

    >>> x.append({})
    >>> t = x[0]
    >>> t["a"] = 5
    >>> x[0] = t

This will not be atomic of course, so this may be something
to take into account.

What maybe could be supported is something like:
    >>> x[0] = manager.dict()
    >>>x[0]["foo"] = "bar"

but otherwise I wouldn't consider this a bug.

It should be documented though.  Similar scenario in the Django docs: http://docs.djangoproject.com/en/1.2/topics/http/sessions/#when-sessions-are-saved

Changing to doc issue.

Is there a way to get this so it behaves more intuitively? You'd think adding a managed list to a managed dictionary (or another managed list) or making a deep copy would work but it still doesn't. When you get an item from a managed data structure, it seems to be returning a data-only copy of the object instead of a handle to the manager of the object. The fact that += (extend) works but .extend() doesn't work also seems to raise a flag for me (although I do understand why this is). I don't think it should behave this way.

i.e.:
currently:
d['l'] -> return copy.deepcopy(d['l'])

should be:
d['l'] -> return managerObject(d['l'])
where managerObject is a managed object that runs on the same process as the manager it came from

Problem: Currently there is no easy way to do random access without copying out and copying back in. I'd think that would be a real efficiency problem.

For now, documented the current behavior in r85534.  If a different solution is desired, a new issue can be opened.