AnyEvent-Fork-Pool/Pool.pm

=head1 NAME

AnyEvent::Fork::Pool - simple process pool manager on top of AnyEvent::Fork

=head1 SYNOPSIS

   use AnyEvent;
   use AnyEvent::Fork::Pool;
   # use AnyEvent::Fork is not needed

   # all possible parameters shown, with default values
   my $pool = AnyEvent::Fork
      ->new
      ->require ("MyWorker")
      ->AnyEvent::Fork::Pool::run (
           "MyWorker::run", # the worker function

           # pool management
           max        => 4,   # absolute maximum # of processes
           idle       => 0,   # minimum # of idle processes
           load       => 2,   # queue at most this number of jobs per process
           start      => 0.1, # wait this many seconds before starting a new process
           stop       => 10,  # wait this many seconds before stopping an idle process
           on_destroy => (my $finish = AE::cv), # called when object is destroyed

           # parameters passed to AnyEvent::Fork::RPC
           async      => 0,
           on_error   => sub { die "FATAL: $_[0]\n" },
           on_event   => sub { my @ev = @_ },
           init       => "MyWorker::init",
           serialiser => $AnyEvent::Fork::RPC::STRING_SERIALISER,
        );

   for (1..10) {
      $pool->(doit => $_, sub {
         print "MyWorker::run returned @_\n";
      });
   }

   undef $pool;

   $finish->recv;

=head1 DESCRIPTION

This module uses processes created via L<AnyEvent::Fork> and the RPC
protocol implement in L<AnyEvent::Fork::RPC> to create a load-balanced
pool of processes that handles jobs.

Understanding of L<AnyEvent::Fork> is helpful but not critical to be able
to use this module, but a thorough understanding of L<AnyEvent::Fork::RPC>
is, as it defines the actual API that needs to be implemented in the
worker processes.

=head1 EXAMPLES

=head1 PARENT USAGE

To create a pool, you first have to create a L<AnyEvent::Fork> object -
this object becomes your template process. Whenever a new worker process
is needed, it is forked from this template process. Then you need to
"hand off" this template process to the C<AnyEvent::Fork::Pool> module by
calling its run method on it:

   my $template = AnyEvent::Fork
                     ->new
                     ->require ("SomeModule", "MyWorkerModule");

   my $pool = $template->AnyEvent::Fork::Pool::run ("MyWorkerModule::myfunction");

The pool "object" is not a regular Perl object, but a code reference that
you can call and that works roughly like calling the worker function
directly, except that it returns nothing but instead you need to specify a
callback to be invoked once results are in:

   $pool->(1, 2, 3, sub { warn "myfunction(1,2,3) returned @_" });

=over 4

=cut

package AnyEvent::Fork::Pool;

use common::sense;

use Scalar::Util ();

use Guard ();
use Array::Heap ();

use AnyEvent;
use AnyEvent::Fork; # we don't actually depend on it, this is for convenience
use AnyEvent::Fork::RPC;

# these are used for the first and last argument of events
# in the hope of not colliding. yes, I don't like it either,
# but didn't come up with an obviously better alternative.
my $magic0 = ':t6Z@HK1N%Dx@_7?=~-7NQgWDdAs6a,jFN=wLO0*jD*1%P';
my $magic1 = '<~53rexz.U`!]X[A235^"fyEoiTF\T~oH1l/N6+Djep9b~bI9`\1x%B~vWO1q*';

our $VERSION = 0.1;

=item my $pool = AnyEvent::Fork::Pool::run $fork, $function, [key => value...]

The traditional way to call the pool creation function. But it is way
cooler to call it in the following way:

=item my $pool = $fork->AnyEvent::Fork::Pool::run ($function, [key => value...])

Creates a new pool object with the specified C<$function> as function
(name) to call for each request. The pool uses the C<$fork> object as the
template when creating worker processes.

You can supply your own template process, or tell C<AnyEvent::Fork::Pool>
to create one.

A relatively large number of key/value pairs can be specified to influence
the behaviour. They are grouped into the categories "pool management",
"template process" and "rpc parameters".

=over 4

=item Pool Management

The pool consists of a certain number of worker processes. These options
decide how many of these processes exist and when they are started and
stopped.

The worker pool is dynamically resized, according to (perceived :)
load. The minimum size is given by the C<idle> parameter and the maximum
size is given by the C<max> parameter. A new worker is started every
C<start> seconds at most, and an idle worker is stopped at most every
C<stop> second.

You can specify the amount of jobs sent to a worker concurrently using the
C<load> parameter.

=over 4

=item idle => $count (default: 0)

The minimum amount of idle processes in the pool - when there are fewer
than this many idle workers, C<AnyEvent::Fork::Pool> will try to start new
ones, subject to the limits set by C<max> and C<start>.

This is also the initial amount of workers in the pool. The default of
zero means that the pool starts empty and can shrink back to zero workers
over time.

=item max => $count (default: 4)

The maximum number of processes in the pool, in addition to the template
process. C<AnyEvent::Fork::Pool> will never have more than this number of
worker processes, although there can be more temporarily when a worker is
shut down and hasn't exited yet.

=item load => $count (default: 2)

The maximum number of concurrent jobs sent to a single worker process.

Jobs that cannot be sent to a worker immediately (because all workers are
busy) will be queued until a worker is available.

Setting this low improves latency. For example, at C<1>, every job that
is sent to a worker is sent to a completely idle worker that doesn't run
any other jobs. The downside is that throughput is reduced - a worker that
finishes a job needs to wait for a new job from the parent.

The default of C<2> is usually a good compromise.

=item start => $seconds (default: 0.1)

When there are fewer than C<idle> workers (or all workers are completely
busy), then a timer is started. If the timer elapses and there are still
jobs that cannot be queued to a worker, a new worker is started.

This sets the minimum time that all workers must be busy before a new
worker is started. Or, put differently, the minimum delay between starting
new workers.

The delay is small by default, which means new workers will be started
relatively quickly. A delay of C<0> is possible, and ensures that the pool
will grow as quickly as possible under load.

Non-zero values are useful to avoid "exploding" a pool because a lot of
jobs are queued in an instant.

Higher values are often useful to improve efficiency at the cost of
latency - when fewer processes can do the job over time, starting more and
more is not necessarily going to help.

=item stop => $seconds (default: 10)

When a worker has no jobs to execute it becomes idle. An idle worker that
hasn't executed a job within this amount of time will be stopped, unless
the other parameters say otherwise.

Setting this to a very high value means that workers stay around longer,
even when they have nothing to do, which can be good as they don't have to
be started on the netx load spike again.

Setting this to a lower value can be useful to avoid memory or simply
process table wastage.

Usually, setting this to a time longer than the time between load spikes
is best - if you expect a lot of requests every minute and little work
in between, setting this to longer than a minute avoids having to stop
and start workers. On the other hand, you have to ask yourself if letting
workers run idle is a good use of your resources. Try to find a good
balance between resource usage of your workers and the time to start new
workers - the processes created by L<AnyEvent::Fork> itself is fats at
creating workers while not using much memory for them, so most of the
overhead is likely from your own code.

=item on_destroy => $callback->() (default: none)

When a pool object goes out of scope, the outstanding requests are still
handled till completion. Only after handling all jobs will the workers
be destroyed (and also the template process if it isn't referenced
otherwise).

To find out when a pool I<really> has finished its work, you can set this
callback, which will be called when the pool has been destroyed.

=back

=item AnyEvent::Fork::RPC Parameters

These parameters are all passed more or less directly to
L<AnyEvent::Fork::RPC>. They are only briefly mentioned here, for
their full documentation please refer to the L<AnyEvent::Fork::RPC>
documentation. Also, the default values mentioned here are only documented
as a best effort - the L<AnyEvent::Fork::RPC> documentation is binding.

=over 4

=item async => $boolean (default: 0)

Whether to use the synchronous or asynchronous RPC backend.

=item on_error => $callback->($message) (default: die with message)

The callback to call on any (fatal) errors.

=item on_event => $callback->(...) (default: C<sub { }>, unlike L<AnyEvent::Fork::RPC>)

The callback to invoke on events.

=item init => $initfunction (default: none)

The function to call in the child, once before handling requests.

=item serialiser => $serialiser (defailt: $AnyEvent::Fork::RPC::STRING_SERIALISER)

The serialiser to use.

=back

=back

=cut

sub run {
   my ($template, $function, %arg) = @_;

   my $max        = $arg{max}        || 4;
   my $idle       = $arg{idle}       || 0,
   my $load       = $arg{load}       || 2,
   my $start      = $arg{start}      || 0.1,
   my $stop       = $arg{stop}       || 10,
   my $on_event   = $arg{on_event}   || sub { },
   my $on_destroy = $arg{on_destroy};

   my @rpc = (
      async      =>        $arg{async},
      init       =>        $arg{init},
      serialiser => delete $arg{serialiser},
      on_error   =>        $arg{on_error},
   );

   my (@pool, @queue, $nidle, $start_w, $stop_w, $shutdown);
   my ($start_worker, $stop_worker, $want_start, $want_stop, $scheduler);

   my $destroy_guard = Guard::guard {
      $on_destroy->()
         if $on_destroy;
   };

   $template
      ->require ("AnyEvent::Fork::RPC::" . ($arg{async} ? "Async" : "Sync"))
      ->eval ('
           my ($magic0, $magic1) = @_;
           sub AnyEvent::Fork::Pool::retire() {
              AnyEvent::Fork::RPC::event $magic0, "quit", $magic1;
           }
        ', $magic0, $magic1)
   ;

   $start_worker = sub {
      my $proc = [0, 0, undef]; # load, index, rpc

      $proc->[2] = $template
         ->fork
         ->AnyEvent::Fork::RPC::run ($function,
              @rpc,
              on_event => sub {
                 if (@_ == 3 && $_[0] eq $magic0 && $_[2] eq $magic1) {
                    $destroy_guard if 0; # keep it alive

                    $_[1] eq "quit" and $stop_worker->($proc);
                    return;
                 }

                 &$on_event;
              },
           )
      ;

      ++$nidle;
      Array::Heap::push_heap_idx @pool, $proc;

      Scalar::Util::weaken $proc;
   };

   $stop_worker = sub {
      my $proc = shift;

      $proc->[0]
         or --$nidle;

      Array::Heap::splice_heap_idx @pool, $proc->[1]
         if defined $proc->[1];
   };

   $want_start = sub {
      undef $stop_w;

      $start_w ||= AE::timer $start, $start, sub {
         if (($nidle < $idle || @queue) && @pool < $max) {
            $start_worker->();
            $scheduler->();
         } else {
            undef $start_w;
         }
      };
   };

   $want_stop = sub {
      $stop_w ||= AE::timer $stop, $stop, sub {
         $stop_worker->($pool[0])
            if $nidle;

         undef $stop_w
            if $nidle <= $idle;
      };
   };

   $scheduler = sub {
      if (@queue) {
         while (@queue) {
            my $proc = $pool[0];

            if ($proc->[0] < $load) {
               # found free worker, increase load
               unless ($proc->[0]++) {
                  # worker became busy
                  --$nidle
                     or undef $stop_w;

                  $want_start->()
                     if $nidle < $idle && @pool < $max;
               }

               Array::Heap::adjust_heap_idx @pool, 0;

               my $job = shift @queue;
               my $ocb = pop @$job;

               $proc->[2]->(@$job, sub {
                  # reduce load
                  --$proc->[0] # worker still busy?
                     or ++$nidle > $idle # not too many idle processes?
                     or $want_stop->();

                  Array::Heap::adjust_heap_idx @pool, $proc->[1]
                     if defined $proc->[1];

                  $scheduler->();

                  &$ocb;
               });
            } else {
               $want_start->()
                  unless @pool >= $max;

               last;
            }
         }
      } elsif ($shutdown) {
         @pool = ();
         undef $start_w;
         undef $start_worker; # frees $destroy_guard reference

         $stop_worker->($pool[0])
            while $nidle;
      }
   };

   my $shutdown_guard = Guard::guard {
      $shutdown = 1;
      $scheduler->();
   };

   $start_worker->()
      while @pool < $idle;

   sub {
      $shutdown_guard if 0; # keep it alive

      $start_worker->()
         unless @pool;

      push @queue, [@_];
      $scheduler->();
   }
}

=item $pool->(..., $cb->(...))

Call the RPC function of a worker with the given arguments, and when the
worker is done, call the C<$cb> with the results, just like calling the
RPC object durectly - see the L<AnyEvent::Fork::RPC> documentation for
details on the RPC API.

If there is no free worker, the call will be queued until a worker becomes
available.

Note that there can be considerable time between calling this method and
the call actually being executed. During this time, the parameters passed
to this function are effectively read-only - modifying them after the call
and before the callback is invoked causes undefined behaviour.

=cut

=back

=head1 CHILD USAGE

In addition to the L<AnyEvent::Fork::RPC> API, this module implements one
more child-side function:

=over 4

=item AnyEvent::Fork::Pool::retire ()

This function sends an event to the parent process to request retirement:
the worker is removed from the pool and no new jobs will be sent to it,
but it has to handle the jobs that are already queued.

The parentheses are part of the syntax: the function usually isn't defined
when you compile your code (because that happens I<before> handing the
template process over to C<AnyEvent::Fork::Pool::run>, so you need the
empty parentheses to tell Perl that the function is indeed a function.

Retiring a worker can be useful to gracefully shut it down when the worker
deems this useful. For example, after executing a job, one could check
the process size or the number of jobs handled so far, and if either is
too high, the worker could ask to get retired, to avoid memory leaks to
accumulate.

=back

=head1 POOL PARAMETERS RECIPES

This section describes some recipes for pool paramaters. These are mostly
meant for the synchronous RPC backend, as the asynchronous RPC backend
changes the rules considerably, making workers themselves responsible for
their scheduling.

=over 4

=item low latency - set load = 1

If you need a deterministic low latency, you should set the C<load>
parameter to C<1>. This ensures that never more than one job is sent to
each worker. This avoids having to wait for a previous job to finish.

This makes most sense with the synchronous (default) backend, as the
asynchronous backend can handle multiple requests concurrently.

=item lowest latency - set load = 1 and idle = max

To achieve the lowest latency, you additionally should disable any dynamic
resizing of the pool by setting C<idle> to the same value as C<max>.

=item high throughput, cpu bound jobs - set load >= 2, max = #cpus

To get high throughput with cpu-bound jobs, you should set the maximum
pool size to the number of cpus in your system, and C<load> to at least
C<2>, to make sure there can be another job waiting for the worker when it
has finished one.

The value of C<2> for C<load> is the minimum value that I<can> achieve
100% throughput, but if your parent process itself is sometimes busy, you
might need higher values. Also there is a limit on the amount of data that
can be "in flight" to the worker, so if you send big blobs of data to your
worker, C<load> might have much less of an effect.

=item high throughput, I/O bound jobs - set load >= 2, max = 1, or very high

When your jobs are I/O bound, using more workers usually boils down to
higher throughput, depending very much on your actual workload - sometimes
having only one worker is best, for example, when you read or write big
files at maixmum speed, as a second worker will increase seek times.

=back

=head1 SEE ALSO

L<AnyEvent::Fork>, to create the processes in the first place.

L<AnyEvent::Fork::RPC>, which implements the RPC protocol and API.

=head1 AUTHOR AND CONTACT INFORMATION

 Marc Lehmann <schmorp@schmorp.de>
 http://software.schmorp.de/pkg/AnyEvent-Fork-Pool

=cut

1

Revision:	1.6
Committed:	Sun Apr 21 11:17:02 2013 UTC (11 years ago) by root
Branch:	MAIN
Changes since 1.5:	+176 -73 lines
Log Message:	* empty log message *
#	User	Rev	Content
1	root	1.1	=head1 NAME
2
3			AnyEvent::Fork::Pool - simple process pool manager on top of AnyEvent::Fork
4
5			=head1 SYNOPSIS
6
7			use AnyEvent;
8			use AnyEvent::Fork::Pool;
9			# use AnyEvent::Fork is not needed
10
11	root	1.6	# all possible parameters shown, with default values
12	root	1.3	my $pool = AnyEvent::Fork
13			->new
14			->require ("MyWorker")
15			->AnyEvent::Fork::Pool::run (
16			"MyWorker::run", # the worker function
17
18			# pool management
19			max => 4, # absolute maximum # of processes
20	root	1.6	idle => 0, # minimum # of idle processes
21	root	1.3	load => 2, # queue at most this number of jobs per process
22			start => 0.1, # wait this many seconds before starting a new process
23	root	1.6	stop => 10, # wait this many seconds before stopping an idle process
24	root	1.3	on_destroy => (my $finish = AE::cv), # called when object is destroyed
25
26			# parameters passed to AnyEvent::Fork::RPC
27			async => 0,
28			on_error => sub { die "FATAL: $_[0]\n" },
29			on_event => sub { my @ev = @_ },
30			init => "MyWorker::init",
31			serialiser => $AnyEvent::Fork::RPC::STRING_SERIALISER,
32			);
33	root	1.1
34			for (1..10) {
35	root	1.3	$pool->(doit => $_, sub {
36	root	1.1	print "MyWorker::run returned @_\n";
37			});
38			}
39
40			undef $pool;
41
42			$finish->recv;
43
44			=head1 DESCRIPTION
45
46			This module uses processes created via L<AnyEvent::Fork> and the RPC
47			protocol implement in L<AnyEvent::Fork::RPC> to create a load-balanced
48			pool of processes that handles jobs.
49
50			Understanding of L<AnyEvent::Fork> is helpful but not critical to be able
51			to use this module, but a thorough understanding of L<AnyEvent::Fork::RPC>
52			is, as it defines the actual API that needs to be implemented in the
53	root	1.6	worker processes.
54	root	1.1
55			=head1 EXAMPLES
56
57	root	1.2	=head1 PARENT USAGE
58	root	1.1
59	root	1.6	To create a pool, you first have to create a L<AnyEvent::Fork> object -
60			this object becomes your template process. Whenever a new worker process
61			is needed, it is forked from this template process. Then you need to
62			"hand off" this template process to the C<AnyEvent::Fork::Pool> module by
63			calling its run method on it:
64
65			my $template = AnyEvent::Fork
66			->new
67			->require ("SomeModule", "MyWorkerModule");
68
69			my $pool = $template->AnyEvent::Fork::Pool::run ("MyWorkerModule::myfunction");
70
71			The pool "object" is not a regular Perl object, but a code reference that
72			you can call and that works roughly like calling the worker function
73			directly, except that it returns nothing but instead you need to specify a
74			callback to be invoked once results are in:
75
76			$pool->(1, 2, 3, sub { warn "myfunction(1,2,3) returned @_" });
77
78	root	1.1	=over 4
79
80			=cut
81
82			package AnyEvent::Fork::Pool;
83
84			use common::sense;
85
86	root	1.2	use Scalar::Util ();
87
88	root	1.3	use Guard ();
89	root	1.2	use Array::Heap ();
90	root	1.1
91			use AnyEvent;
92			use AnyEvent::Fork; # we don't actually depend on it, this is for convenience
93			use AnyEvent::Fork::RPC;
94
95	root	1.3	# these are used for the first and last argument of events
96			# in the hope of not colliding. yes, I don't like it either,
97			# but didn't come up with an obviously better alternative.
98	root	1.2	my $magic0 = ':t6Z@HK1N%Dx@_7?=~-7NQgWDdAs6a,jFN=wLO0jD1%P';
99	root	1.3	my $magic1 = '<~53rexz.U`!]X[A235^"fyEoiTF\T~oH1l/N6+Djep9b~bI9`\1x%B~vWO1q*';
100	root	1.2
101	root	1.1	our $VERSION = 0.1;
102
103	root	1.5	=item my $pool = AnyEvent::Fork::Pool::run $fork, $function, [key => value...]
104	root	1.3
105	root	1.6	The traditional way to call the pool creation function. But it is way
106			cooler to call it in the following way:
107	root	1.3
108	root	1.5	=item my $pool = $fork->AnyEvent::Fork::Pool::run ($function, [key => value...])
109	root	1.2
110			Creates a new pool object with the specified C<$function> as function
111	root	1.3	(name) to call for each request. The pool uses the C<$fork> object as the
112			template when creating worker processes.
113	root	1.2
114			You can supply your own template process, or tell C<AnyEvent::Fork::Pool>
115			to create one.
116
117			A relatively large number of key/value pairs can be specified to influence
118			the behaviour. They are grouped into the categories "pool management",
119			"template process" and "rpc parameters".
120	root	1.1
121			=over 4
122
123	root	1.2	=item Pool Management
124
125			The pool consists of a certain number of worker processes. These options
126			decide how many of these processes exist and when they are started and
127	root	1.5	stopped.
128	root	1.2
129	root	1.6	The worker pool is dynamically resized, according to (perceived :)
130			load. The minimum size is given by the C<idle> parameter and the maximum
131			size is given by the C<max> parameter. A new worker is started every
132			C<start> seconds at most, and an idle worker is stopped at most every
133			C<stop> second.
134
135			You can specify the amount of jobs sent to a worker concurrently using the
136			C<load> parameter.
137
138	root	1.2	=over 4
139
140	root	1.3	=item idle => $count (default: 0)
141	root	1.2
142	root	1.3	The minimum amount of idle processes in the pool - when there are fewer
143			than this many idle workers, C<AnyEvent::Fork::Pool> will try to start new
144	root	1.6	ones, subject to the limits set by C<max> and C<start>.
145	root	1.3
146	root	1.6	This is also the initial amount of workers in the pool. The default of
147			zero means that the pool starts empty and can shrink back to zero workers
148			over time.
149	root	1.2
150			=item max => $count (default: 4)
151
152			The maximum number of processes in the pool, in addition to the template
153	root	1.6	process. C<AnyEvent::Fork::Pool> will never have more than this number of
154			worker processes, although there can be more temporarily when a worker is
155			shut down and hasn't exited yet.
156	root	1.2
157	root	1.3	=item load => $count (default: 2)
158	root	1.2
159	root	1.6	The maximum number of concurrent jobs sent to a single worker process.
160	root	1.1
161	root	1.2	Jobs that cannot be sent to a worker immediately (because all workers are
162			busy) will be queued until a worker is available.
163	root	1.1
164	root	1.6	Setting this low improves latency. For example, at C<1>, every job that
165			is sent to a worker is sent to a completely idle worker that doesn't run
166			any other jobs. The downside is that throughput is reduced - a worker that
167			finishes a job needs to wait for a new job from the parent.
168
169			The default of C<2> is usually a good compromise.
170
171	root	1.3	=item start => $seconds (default: 0.1)
172	root	1.1
173	root	1.6	When there are fewer than C<idle> workers (or all workers are completely
174			busy), then a timer is started. If the timer elapses and there are still
175			jobs that cannot be queued to a worker, a new worker is started.
176
177			This sets the minimum time that all workers must be busy before a new
178			worker is started. Or, put differently, the minimum delay between starting
179			new workers.
180
181			The delay is small by default, which means new workers will be started
182			relatively quickly. A delay of C<0> is possible, and ensures that the pool
183			will grow as quickly as possible under load.
184
185			Non-zero values are useful to avoid "exploding" a pool because a lot of
186			jobs are queued in an instant.
187
188			Higher values are often useful to improve efficiency at the cost of
189			latency - when fewer processes can do the job over time, starting more and
190			more is not necessarily going to help.
191	root	1.1
192	root	1.6	=item stop => $seconds (default: 10)
193	root	1.1
194	root	1.2	When a worker has no jobs to execute it becomes idle. An idle worker that
195			hasn't executed a job within this amount of time will be stopped, unless
196			the other parameters say otherwise.
197
198	root	1.6	Setting this to a very high value means that workers stay around longer,
199			even when they have nothing to do, which can be good as they don't have to
200			be started on the netx load spike again.
201
202			Setting this to a lower value can be useful to avoid memory or simply
203			process table wastage.
204
205			Usually, setting this to a time longer than the time between load spikes
206			is best - if you expect a lot of requests every minute and little work
207			in between, setting this to longer than a minute avoids having to stop
208			and start workers. On the other hand, you have to ask yourself if letting
209			workers run idle is a good use of your resources. Try to find a good
210			balance between resource usage of your workers and the time to start new
211			workers - the processes created by L<AnyEvent::Fork> itself is fats at
212			creating workers while not using much memory for them, so most of the
213			overhead is likely from your own code.
214
215	root	1.2	=item on_destroy => $callback->() (default: none)
216
217	root	1.6	When a pool object goes out of scope, the outstanding requests are still
218			handled till completion. Only after handling all jobs will the workers
219			be destroyed (and also the template process if it isn't referenced
220			otherwise).
221	root	1.2
222	root	1.6	To find out when a pool I<really> has finished its work, you can set this
223			callback, which will be called when the pool has been destroyed.
224	root	1.2
225			=back
226
227			=item AnyEvent::Fork::RPC Parameters
228
229	root	1.6	These parameters are all passed more or less directly to
230			L<AnyEvent::Fork::RPC>. They are only briefly mentioned here, for
231			their full documentation please refer to the L<AnyEvent::Fork::RPC>
232			documentation. Also, the default values mentioned here are only documented
233			as a best effort - the L<AnyEvent::Fork::RPC> documentation is binding.
234	root	1.2
235			=over 4
236	root	1.1
237			=item async => $boolean (default: 0)
238
239	root	1.6	Whether to use the synchronous or asynchronous RPC backend.
240	root	1.1
241	root	1.2	=item on_error => $callback->($message) (default: die with message)
242	root	1.1
243	root	1.2	The callback to call on any (fatal) errors.
244	root	1.1
245	root	1.2	=item on_event => $callback->(...) (default: C<sub { }>, unlike L<AnyEvent::Fork::RPC>)
246	root	1.1
247	root	1.2	The callback to invoke on events.
248	root	1.1
249	root	1.2	=item init => $initfunction (default: none)
250	root	1.1
251	root	1.2	The function to call in the child, once before handling requests.
252	root	1.1
253	root	1.2	=item serialiser => $serialiser (defailt: $AnyEvent::Fork::RPC::STRING_SERIALISER)
254	root	1.1
255	root	1.2	The serialiser to use.
256	root	1.1
257	root	1.2	=back
258	root	1.1
259			=back
260
261			=cut
262
263	root	1.3	sub run {
264			my ($template, $function, %arg) = @_;
265
266			my $max = $arg{max} \|\| 4;
267			my $idle = $arg{idle} \|\| 0,
268			my $load = $arg{load} \|\| 2,
269			my $start = $arg{start} \|\| 0.1,
270	root	1.6	my $stop = $arg{stop} \|\| 10,
271	root	1.3	my $on_event = $arg{on_event} \|\| sub { },
272			my $on_destroy = $arg{on_destroy};
273
274			my @rpc = (
275	root	1.5	async => $arg{async},
276			init => $arg{init},
277			serialiser => delete $arg{serialiser},
278			on_error => $arg{on_error},
279	root	1.3	);
280
281			my (@pool, @queue, $nidle, $start_w, $stop_w, $shutdown);
282	root	1.5	my ($start_worker, $stop_worker, $want_start, $want_stop, $scheduler);
283	root	1.3
284			my $destroy_guard = Guard::guard {
285			$on_destroy->()
286			if $on_destroy;
287			};
288	root	1.2
289	root	1.3	$template
290			->require ("AnyEvent::Fork::RPC::" . ($arg{async} ? "Async" : "Sync"))
291	root	1.2	->eval ('
292	root	1.3	my ($magic0, $magic1) = @_;
293	root	1.6	sub AnyEvent::Fork::Pool::retire() {
294			AnyEvent::Fork::RPC::event $magic0, "quit", $magic1;
295	root	1.2	}
296	root	1.3	', $magic0, $magic1)
297	root	1.6	;
298	root	1.3
299	root	1.5	$start_worker = sub {
300	root	1.3	my $proc = [0, 0, undef]; # load, index, rpc
301	root	1.2
302	root	1.3	$proc->[2] = $template
303			->fork
304			->AnyEvent::Fork::RPC::run ($function,
305			@rpc,
306			on_event => sub {
307			if (@_ == 3 && $_[0] eq $magic0 && $_[2] eq $magic1) {
308			$destroy_guard if 0; # keep it alive
309	root	1.2
310	root	1.5	$_[1] eq "quit" and $stop_worker->($proc);
311	root	1.3	return;
312	root	1.2	}
313
314	root	1.3	&$on_event;
315			},
316			)
317			;
318
319			++$nidle;
320	root	1.5	Array::Heap::push_heap_idx @pool, $proc;
321	root	1.3
322			Scalar::Util::weaken $proc;
323			};
324
325	root	1.5	$stop_worker = sub {
326	root	1.3	my $proc = shift;
327
328			$proc->[0]
329			or --$nidle;
330
331			Array::Heap::splice_heap_idx @pool, $proc->[1]
332			if defined $proc->[1];
333			};
334
335			$want_start = sub {
336			undef $stop_w;
337
338	root	1.5	$start_w \|\|= AE::timer $start, $start, sub {
339			if (($nidle < $idle \|\| @queue) && @pool < $max) {
340			$start_worker->();
341	root	1.3	$scheduler->();
342	root	1.5	} else {
343			undef $start_w;
344	root	1.3	}
345			};
346			};
347
348			$want_stop = sub {
349	root	1.5	$stop_w \|\|= AE::timer $stop, $stop, sub {
350			$stop_worker->($pool[0])
351			if $nidle;
352	root	1.3
353	root	1.5	undef $stop_w
354			if $nidle <= $idle;
355	root	1.3	};
356			};
357
358			$scheduler = sub {
359			if (@queue) {
360			while (@queue) {
361			my $proc = $pool[0];
362
363			if ($proc->[0] < $load) {
364	root	1.5	# found free worker, increase load
365			unless ($proc->[0]++) {
366			# worker became busy
367			--$nidle
368			or undef $stop_w;
369
370			$want_start->()
371			if $nidle < $idle && @pool < $max;
372			}
373	root	1.3
374	root	1.5	Array::Heap::adjust_heap_idx @pool, 0;
375	root	1.3
376			my $job = shift @queue;
377			my $ocb = pop @$job;
378
379			$proc->[2]->(@$job, sub {
380	root	1.5	# reduce load
381			--$proc->[0] # worker still busy?
382			or ++$nidle > $idle # not too many idle processes?
383	root	1.3	or $want_stop->();
384
385	root	1.5	Array::Heap::adjust_heap_idx @pool, $proc->[1]
386			if defined $proc->[1];
387	root	1.3
388			$scheduler->();
389
390			&$ocb;
391			});
392			} else {
393	root	1.5	$want_start->()
394			unless @pool >= $max;
395	root	1.3
396			last;
397			}
398			}
399			} elsif ($shutdown) {
400			@pool = ();
401			undef $start_w;
402	root	1.5	undef $start_worker; # frees $destroy_guard reference
403	root	1.3
404	root	1.5	$stop_worker->($pool[0])
405	root	1.3	while $nidle;
406			}
407			};
408
409			my $shutdown_guard = Guard::guard {
410			$shutdown = 1;
411			$scheduler->();
412			};
413
414	root	1.5	$start_worker->()
415	root	1.3	while @pool < $idle;
416
417			sub {
418			$shutdown_guard if 0; # keep it alive
419	root	1.2
420	root	1.5	$start_worker->()
421	root	1.3	unless @pool;
422
423			push @queue, [@_];
424			$scheduler->();
425			}
426	root	1.2	}
427
428	root	1.5	=item $pool->(..., $cb->(...))
429	root	1.2
430			Call the RPC function of a worker with the given arguments, and when the
431	root	1.5	worker is done, call the C<$cb> with the results, just like calling the
432	root	1.6	RPC object durectly - see the L<AnyEvent::Fork::RPC> documentation for
433			details on the RPC API.
434	root	1.2
435	root	1.6	If there is no free worker, the call will be queued until a worker becomes
436			available.
437	root	1.2
438			Note that there can be considerable time between calling this method and
439			the call actually being executed. During this time, the parameters passed
440			to this function are effectively read-only - modifying them after the call
441			and before the callback is invoked causes undefined behaviour.
442
443			=cut
444	root	1.1
445			=back
446
447	root	1.6	=head1 CHILD USAGE
448
449			In addition to the L<AnyEvent::Fork::RPC> API, this module implements one
450			more child-side function:
451
452			=over 4
453
454			=item AnyEvent::Fork::Pool::retire ()
455
456			This function sends an event to the parent process to request retirement:
457			the worker is removed from the pool and no new jobs will be sent to it,
458			but it has to handle the jobs that are already queued.
459
460			The parentheses are part of the syntax: the function usually isn't defined
461			when you compile your code (because that happens I<before> handing the
462			template process over to C<AnyEvent::Fork::Pool::run>, so you need the
463			empty parentheses to tell Perl that the function is indeed a function.
464
465			Retiring a worker can be useful to gracefully shut it down when the worker
466			deems this useful. For example, after executing a job, one could check
467			the process size or the number of jobs handled so far, and if either is
468			too high, the worker could ask to get retired, to avoid memory leaks to
469			accumulate.
470
471			=back
472
473			=head1 POOL PARAMETERS RECIPES
474
475			This section describes some recipes for pool paramaters. These are mostly
476			meant for the synchronous RPC backend, as the asynchronous RPC backend
477			changes the rules considerably, making workers themselves responsible for
478			their scheduling.
479
480			=over 4
481
482			=item low latency - set load = 1
483
484			If you need a deterministic low latency, you should set the C<load>
485			parameter to C<1>. This ensures that never more than one job is sent to
486			each worker. This avoids having to wait for a previous job to finish.
487
488			This makes most sense with the synchronous (default) backend, as the
489			asynchronous backend can handle multiple requests concurrently.
490
491			=item lowest latency - set load = 1 and idle = max
492
493			To achieve the lowest latency, you additionally should disable any dynamic
494			resizing of the pool by setting C<idle> to the same value as C<max>.
495
496			=item high throughput, cpu bound jobs - set load >= 2, max = #cpus
497
498			To get high throughput with cpu-bound jobs, you should set the maximum
499			pool size to the number of cpus in your system, and C<load> to at least
500			C<2>, to make sure there can be another job waiting for the worker when it
501			has finished one.
502
503			The value of C<2> for C<load> is the minimum value that I<can> achieve
504			100% throughput, but if your parent process itself is sometimes busy, you
505			might need higher values. Also there is a limit on the amount of data that
506			can be "in flight" to the worker, so if you send big blobs of data to your
507			worker, C<load> might have much less of an effect.
508
509			=item high throughput, I/O bound jobs - set load >= 2, max = 1, or very high
510
511			When your jobs are I/O bound, using more workers usually boils down to
512			higher throughput, depending very much on your actual workload - sometimes
513			having only one worker is best, for example, when you read or write big
514			files at maixmum speed, as a second worker will increase seek times.
515
516			=back
517
518	root	1.1	=head1 SEE ALSO
519
520			L<AnyEvent::Fork>, to create the processes in the first place.
521
522			L<AnyEvent::Fork::RPC>, which implements the RPC protocol and API.
523
524			=head1 AUTHOR AND CONTACT INFORMATION
525
526			Marc Lehmann <schmorp@schmorp.de>
527			http://software.schmorp.de/pkg/AnyEvent-Fork-Pool
528
529			=cut
530
531			1
532