Probably better just to check HEAD and see if its updated within the time you're looking at before any unpack. Even on a 56k that's going to be pretty fast, and you don't risk unpacking an old file while a new version is on the way.
If you still want to be able to unpack the old file if there's an update then you're probably right about needing to run it concurrently, and personally I'd just fork it for ease of use- it doesn't sound like you're trying to run 100,000 of these at the same time, and you're saving the file anyway. Geremy Condra -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
