This little guy is often misunderstood and underutilized in the world of programming, but don’t worry bro!, because today we’re gonna set things straight.

First off, lets start with what `fork()` actually does. In simple terms, it creates a copy (or “child”) process that runs alongside your current Python script. This can be useful for certain tasks like running multiple processes simultaneously or performing long-running operations without blocking the main thread of execution.

But here’s where things get interesting `fork()` has some serious limitations! For starters, it only works on Unix/Linux systems (sorry Windows users). And even then, there are a ton of caveats and gotchas that can make using `fork()` more trouble than it’s worth.

For example, when you call `fork()`, the child process inherits all of the resources from the parent process including open files, memory usage, and even the current directory! This means that if your script is doing a lot of I/O or using up a ton of system resources, calling `fork()` can actually make things worse.

Another limitation of `fork()` is that it’s not thread-safe meaning you can’t use it in conjunction with other Python threads without causing all sorts of headaches and errors. And even if you do manage to get everything working, the performance hit from using multiple processes instead of threads can be significant.

So what’s the alternative? Well, for most tasks, it’s better to stick with good old-fashioned Python threads or asyncio coroutines. These are much more lightweight and easier to manage than `fork()`, and they don’t have all of the same limitations and caveats.

But if you absolutely must use `fork()` for some reason, just be aware that it comes with a lot of baggage both literal (in terms of system resources) and figurative (in terms of complexity). And remember, as always, readability counts!