Assertion failure in import-repeatedly test with Debian's python3.12-dbg or newer

To reproduce:

• Have a Debian or Ubuntu version where Python is 3.12 or later
• Install python3-dbg and python3-dev
• meson setup -Dpython=python3-dbg ${builddir}
• meson compile -C ${builddir}
• meson test -C ${builddir}

where test/import-repeatedly.py has the same contents as it did in 1.3.2:

/* Regression test for https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=23831 */
/*
 * Copyright 2010-2016 Collabora Ltd.
 * SPDX-License-Identifier: MIT
 */

#include <stdio.h>

#include <Python.h>

int main(void)
{
    int i;

    puts("1..1");

    for (i = 0; i < 100; ++i) {
        Py_Initialize();
        if (PyRun_SimpleString("import dbus\n") != 0) {
            puts("not ok 1 - there was an exception");
            return 1;
        }
        Py_Finalize();
    }

    puts("ok 1 - was able to import dbus 100 times");

    return 0;
}

Expected result: tests pass, as they do for Python 3.11 or older, or for plain python3 rather than python3-dbg.

Actual result: it crashes out with this assertion failure:

test-import-repeatedly: ../Objects/dictobject.c:1140: compare_unicode_unicode: Assertion `PyUnicode_CheckExact(ep_key)' failed.

Workarounds: any one of:

• Only initialize and finalize Python once (move Py_Initialize() and Py_Finalize() outside the loop)
• Use Python 3.11 or older
• Use the ordinary python3 interpreter instead of the python3-dbg debug interpreter

It is not clear to me whether this is a Python regression, or whether dbus-python is doing something wrong,or what. Anyone who wants to embed dbus-python in a larger process, and be able to initialize and finalize the Python interpreter more than once, is invited to investigate this.

added 1. Bug 1. Crash 1. Test failure 4. Help wanted labels

mentioned in commit 534d906f

mentioned in commit ebecd174

mentioned in merge request !35 (merged)

closed with commit ebecd174