ViewVC Help
View File | Revision Log | Show Annotations | Download File
/cvs/AnyEvent/lib/AnyEvent.pm
(Generate patch)

Comparing AnyEvent/lib/AnyEvent.pm (file contents):
Revision 1.6 by root, Mon Dec 19 17:03:29 2005 UTC vs.
Revision 1.172 by root, Thu Jul 17 15:21:02 2008 UTC

1=head1 NAME 1=head1 NAME
2 2
3AnyEvent - provide framework for multiple event loops 3AnyEvent - provide framework for multiple event loops
4 4
5Event, Coro, Glib, Tk - various supported event loops 5EV, Event, Glib, Tk, Perl, Event::Lib, Qt, POE - various supported event loops
6 6
7=head1 SYNOPSIS 7=head1 SYNOPSIS
8 8
9use AnyEvent; 9 use AnyEvent;
10 10
11 my $w = AnyEvent->io (fh => ..., poll => "[rw]+", cb => sub { 11 my $w = AnyEvent->io (fh => $fh, poll => "r|w", cb => sub {
12 my ($poll_got) = @_;
13 ... 12 ...
14 }); 13 });
15
16- only one io watcher per $fh and $poll type is allowed
17(i.e. on a socket you can have one r + one w or one rw
18watcher, not any more.
19
20- AnyEvent will keep filehandles alive, so as long as the watcher exists,
21the filehandle exists.
22 14
23 my $w = AnyEvent->timer (after => $seconds, cb => sub { 15 my $w = AnyEvent->timer (after => $seconds, cb => sub {
24 ... 16 ...
25 }); 17 });
26 18
27- io and time watchers get canceled whenever $w is destroyed, so keep a copy 19 my $w = AnyEvent->condvar; # stores whether a condition was flagged
28 20 $w->send; # wake up current and all future recv's
29- timers can only be used once and must be recreated for repeated operation
30
31 my $w = AnyEvent->condvar; # kind of main loop replacement
32 $w->wait; # enters main loop till $condvar gets ->broadcast 21 $w->recv; # enters "main loop" till $condvar gets ->send
33 $w->broadcast; # wake up current and all future wait's
34 22
35- condvars are used to give blocking behaviour when neccessary. Create 23=head1 INTRODUCTION/TUTORIAL
36a condvar for any "request" or "event" your module might create, C<< 24
37->broadcast >> it when the event happens and provide a function that calls 25This manpage is mainly a reference manual. If you are interested
38C<< ->wait >> for it. See the examples below. 26in a tutorial or some gentle introduction, have a look at the
27L<AnyEvent::Intro> manpage.
28
29=head1 WHY YOU SHOULD USE THIS MODULE (OR NOT)
30
31Glib, POE, IO::Async, Event... CPAN offers event models by the dozen
32nowadays. So what is different about AnyEvent?
33
34Executive Summary: AnyEvent is I<compatible>, AnyEvent is I<free of
35policy> and AnyEvent is I<small and efficient>.
36
37First and foremost, I<AnyEvent is not an event model> itself, it only
38interfaces to whatever event model the main program happens to use, in a
39pragmatic way. For event models and certain classes of immortals alike,
40the statement "there can only be one" is a bitter reality: In general,
41only one event loop can be active at the same time in a process. AnyEvent
42cannot change this, but it can hide the differences between those event
43loops.
44
45The goal of AnyEvent is to offer module authors the ability to do event
46programming (waiting for I/O or timer events) without subscribing to a
47religion, a way of living, and most importantly: without forcing your
48module users into the same thing by forcing them to use the same event
49model you use.
50
51For modules like POE or IO::Async (which is a total misnomer as it is
52actually doing all I/O I<synchronously>...), using them in your module is
53like joining a cult: After you joined, you are dependent on them and you
54cannot use anything else, as they are simply incompatible to everything
55that isn't them. What's worse, all the potential users of your
56module are I<also> forced to use the same event loop you use.
57
58AnyEvent is different: AnyEvent + POE works fine. AnyEvent + Glib works
59fine. AnyEvent + Tk works fine etc. etc. but none of these work together
60with the rest: POE + IO::Async? No go. Tk + Event? No go. Again: if
61your module uses one of those, every user of your module has to use it,
62too. But if your module uses AnyEvent, it works transparently with all
63event models it supports (including stuff like IO::Async, as long as those
64use one of the supported event loops. It is trivial to add new event loops
65to AnyEvent, too, so it is future-proof).
66
67In addition to being free of having to use I<the one and only true event
68model>, AnyEvent also is free of bloat and policy: with POE or similar
69modules, you get an enormous amount of code and strict rules you have to
70follow. AnyEvent, on the other hand, is lean and up to the point, by only
71offering the functionality that is necessary, in as thin as a wrapper as
72technically possible.
73
74Of course, AnyEvent comes with a big (and fully optional!) toolbox
75of useful functionality, such as an asynchronous DNS resolver, 100%
76non-blocking connects (even with TLS/SSL, IPv6 and on broken platforms
77such as Windows) and lots of real-world knowledge and workarounds for
78platform bugs and differences.
79
80Now, if you I<do want> lots of policy (this can arguably be somewhat
81useful) and you want to force your users to use the one and only event
82model, you should I<not> use this module.
39 83
40=head1 DESCRIPTION 84=head1 DESCRIPTION
41 85
42L<AnyEvent> provides an identical interface to multiple event loops. This 86L<AnyEvent> provides an identical interface to multiple event loops. This
43allows module authors to utilizy an event loop without forcing module 87allows module authors to utilise an event loop without forcing module
44users to use the same event loop (as only a single event loop can coexist 88users to use the same event loop (as only a single event loop can coexist
45peacefully at any one time). 89peacefully at any one time).
46 90
47The interface itself is vaguely similar but not identical to the Event 91The interface itself is vaguely similar, but not identical to the L<Event>
48module. 92module.
49 93
50On the first call of any method, the module tries to detect the currently 94During the first call of any watcher-creation method, the module tries
51loaded event loop by probing wether any of the following modules is 95to detect the currently loaded event loop by probing whether one of the
52loaded: L<Coro::Event>, L<Event>, L<Glib>, L<Tk>. The first one found is 96following modules is already loaded: L<EV>,
53used. If none is found, the module tries to load these modules in the 97L<Event>, L<Glib>, L<AnyEvent::Impl::Perl>, L<Tk>, L<Event::Lib>, L<Qt>,
54order given. The first one that could be successfully loaded will be 98L<POE>. The first one found is used. If none are found, the module tries
55used. If still none could be found, it will issue an error. 99to load these modules (excluding Tk, Event::Lib, Qt and POE as the pure perl
100adaptor should always succeed) in the order given. The first one that can
101be successfully loaded will be used. If, after this, still none could be
102found, AnyEvent will fall back to a pure-perl event loop, which is not
103very efficient, but should work everywhere.
104
105Because AnyEvent first checks for modules that are already loaded, loading
106an event model explicitly before first using AnyEvent will likely make
107that model the default. For example:
108
109 use Tk;
110 use AnyEvent;
111
112 # .. AnyEvent will likely default to Tk
113
114The I<likely> means that, if any module loads another event model and
115starts using it, all bets are off. Maybe you should tell their authors to
116use AnyEvent so their modules work together with others seamlessly...
117
118The pure-perl implementation of AnyEvent is called
119C<AnyEvent::Impl::Perl>. Like other event modules you can load it
120explicitly and enjoy the high availability of that event loop :)
121
122=head1 WATCHERS
123
124AnyEvent has the central concept of a I<watcher>, which is an object that
125stores relevant data for each kind of event you are waiting for, such as
126the callback to call, the file handle to watch, etc.
127
128These watchers are normal Perl objects with normal Perl lifetime. After
129creating a watcher it will immediately "watch" for events and invoke the
130callback when the event occurs (of course, only when the event model
131is in control).
132
133To disable the watcher you have to destroy it (e.g. by setting the
134variable you store it in to C<undef> or otherwise deleting all references
135to it).
136
137All watchers are created by calling a method on the C<AnyEvent> class.
138
139Many watchers either are used with "recursion" (repeating timers for
140example), or need to refer to their watcher object in other ways.
141
142An any way to achieve that is this pattern:
143
144 my $w; $w = AnyEvent->type (arg => value ..., cb => sub {
145 # you can use $w here, for example to undef it
146 undef $w;
147 });
148
149Note that C<my $w; $w => combination. This is necessary because in Perl,
150my variables are only visible after the statement in which they are
151declared.
152
153=head2 I/O WATCHERS
154
155You can create an I/O watcher by calling the C<< AnyEvent->io >> method
156with the following mandatory key-value pairs as arguments:
157
158C<fh> the Perl I<file handle> (I<not> file descriptor) to watch for events
159(AnyEvent might or might not keep a reference to this file handle). C<poll>
160must be a string that is either C<r> or C<w>, which creates a watcher
161waiting for "r"eadable or "w"ritable events, respectively. C<cb> is the
162callback to invoke each time the file handle becomes ready.
163
164Although the callback might get passed parameters, their value and
165presence is undefined and you cannot rely on them. Portable AnyEvent
166callbacks cannot use arguments passed to I/O watcher callbacks.
167
168The I/O watcher might use the underlying file descriptor or a copy of it.
169You must not close a file handle as long as any watcher is active on the
170underlying file descriptor.
171
172Some event loops issue spurious readyness notifications, so you should
173always use non-blocking calls when reading/writing from/to your file
174handles.
175
176Example: wait for readability of STDIN, then read a line and disable the
177watcher.
178
179 my $w; $w = AnyEvent->io (fh => \*STDIN, poll => 'r', cb => sub {
180 chomp (my $input = <STDIN>);
181 warn "read: $input\n";
182 undef $w;
183 });
184
185=head2 TIME WATCHERS
186
187You can create a time watcher by calling the C<< AnyEvent->timer >>
188method with the following mandatory arguments:
189
190C<after> specifies after how many seconds (fractional values are
191supported) the callback should be invoked. C<cb> is the callback to invoke
192in that case.
193
194Although the callback might get passed parameters, their value and
195presence is undefined and you cannot rely on them. Portable AnyEvent
196callbacks cannot use arguments passed to time watcher callbacks.
197
198The callback will normally be invoked once only. If you specify another
199parameter, C<interval>, as a strictly positive number (> 0), then the
200callback will be invoked regularly at that interval (in fractional
201seconds) after the first invocation. If C<interval> is specified with a
202false value, then it is treated as if it were missing.
203
204The callback will be rescheduled before invoking the callback, but no
205attempt is done to avoid timer drift in most backends, so the interval is
206only approximate.
207
208Example: fire an event after 7.7 seconds.
209
210 my $w = AnyEvent->timer (after => 7.7, cb => sub {
211 warn "timeout\n";
212 });
213
214 # to cancel the timer:
215 undef $w;
216
217Example 2: fire an event after 0.5 seconds, then roughly every second.
218
219 my $w = AnyEvent->timer (after => 0.5, interval => 1, cb => sub {
220 warn "timeout\n";
221 };
222
223=head3 TIMING ISSUES
224
225There are two ways to handle timers: based on real time (relative, "fire
226in 10 seconds") and based on wallclock time (absolute, "fire at 12
227o'clock").
228
229While most event loops expect timers to specified in a relative way, they
230use absolute time internally. This makes a difference when your clock
231"jumps", for example, when ntp decides to set your clock backwards from
232the wrong date of 2014-01-01 to 2008-01-01, a watcher that is supposed to
233fire "after" a second might actually take six years to finally fire.
234
235AnyEvent cannot compensate for this. The only event loop that is conscious
236about these issues is L<EV>, which offers both relative (ev_timer, based
237on true relative time) and absolute (ev_periodic, based on wallclock time)
238timers.
239
240AnyEvent always prefers relative timers, if available, matching the
241AnyEvent API.
242
243AnyEvent has two additional methods that return the "current time":
56 244
57=over 4 245=over 4
58 246
247=item AnyEvent->time
248
249This returns the "current wallclock time" as a fractional number of
250seconds since the Epoch (the same thing as C<time> or C<Time::HiRes::time>
251return, and the result is guaranteed to be compatible with those).
252
253It progresses independently of any event loop processing, i.e. each call
254will check the system clock, which usually gets updated frequently.
255
256=item AnyEvent->now
257
258This also returns the "current wallclock time", but unlike C<time>, above,
259this value might change only once per event loop iteration, depending on
260the event loop (most return the same time as C<time>, above). This is the
261time that AnyEvent's timers get scheduled against.
262
263I<In almost all cases (in all cases if you don't care), this is the
264function to call when you want to know the current time.>
265
266This function is also often faster then C<< AnyEvent->time >>, and
267thus the preferred method if you want some timestamp (for example,
268L<AnyEvent::Handle> uses this to update it's activity timeouts).
269
270The rest of this section is only of relevance if you try to be very exact
271with your timing, you can skip it without bad conscience.
272
273For a practical example of when these times differ, consider L<Event::Lib>
274and L<EV> and the following set-up:
275
276The event loop is running and has just invoked one of your callback at
277time=500 (assume no other callbacks delay processing). In your callback,
278you wait a second by executing C<sleep 1> (blocking the process for a
279second) and then (at time=501) you create a relative timer that fires
280after three seconds.
281
282With L<Event::Lib>, C<< AnyEvent->time >> and C<< AnyEvent->now >> will
283both return C<501>, because that is the current time, and the timer will
284be scheduled to fire at time=504 (C<501> + C<3>).
285
286With L<EV>, C<< AnyEvent->time >> returns C<501> (as that is the current
287time), but C<< AnyEvent->now >> returns C<500>, as that is the time the
288last event processing phase started. With L<EV>, your timer gets scheduled
289to run at time=503 (C<500> + C<3>).
290
291In one sense, L<Event::Lib> is more exact, as it uses the current time
292regardless of any delays introduced by event processing. However, most
293callbacks do not expect large delays in processing, so this causes a
294higher drift (and a lot more system calls to get the current time).
295
296In another sense, L<EV> is more exact, as your timer will be scheduled at
297the same time, regardless of how long event processing actually took.
298
299In either case, if you care (and in most cases, you don't), then you
300can get whatever behaviour you want with any event loop, by taking the
301difference between C<< AnyEvent->time >> and C<< AnyEvent->now >> into
302account.
303
304=back
305
306=head2 SIGNAL WATCHERS
307
308You can watch for signals using a signal watcher, C<signal> is the signal
309I<name> in uppercase and without any C<SIG> prefix, C<cb> is the Perl
310callback to be invoked whenever a signal occurs.
311
312Although the callback might get passed parameters, their value and
313presence is undefined and you cannot rely on them. Portable AnyEvent
314callbacks cannot use arguments passed to signal watcher callbacks.
315
316Multiple signal occurrences can be clumped together into one callback
317invocation, and callback invocation will be synchronous. Synchronous means
318that it might take a while until the signal gets handled by the process,
319but it is guaranteed not to interrupt any other callbacks.
320
321The main advantage of using these watchers is that you can share a signal
322between multiple watchers.
323
324This watcher might use C<%SIG>, so programs overwriting those signals
325directly will likely not work correctly.
326
327Example: exit on SIGINT
328
329 my $w = AnyEvent->signal (signal => "INT", cb => sub { exit 1 });
330
331=head2 CHILD PROCESS WATCHERS
332
333You can also watch on a child process exit and catch its exit status.
334
335The child process is specified by the C<pid> argument (if set to C<0>, it
336watches for any child process exit). The watcher will trigger as often
337as status change for the child are received. This works by installing a
338signal handler for C<SIGCHLD>. The callback will be called with the pid
339and exit status (as returned by waitpid), so unlike other watcher types,
340you I<can> rely on child watcher callback arguments.
341
342There is a slight catch to child watchers, however: you usually start them
343I<after> the child process was created, and this means the process could
344have exited already (and no SIGCHLD will be sent anymore).
345
346Not all event models handle this correctly (POE doesn't), but even for
347event models that I<do> handle this correctly, they usually need to be
348loaded before the process exits (i.e. before you fork in the first place).
349
350This means you cannot create a child watcher as the very first thing in an
351AnyEvent program, you I<have> to create at least one watcher before you
352C<fork> the child (alternatively, you can call C<AnyEvent::detect>).
353
354Example: fork a process and wait for it
355
356 my $done = AnyEvent->condvar;
357
358 my $pid = fork or exit 5;
359
360 my $w = AnyEvent->child (
361 pid => $pid,
362 cb => sub {
363 my ($pid, $status) = @_;
364 warn "pid $pid exited with status $status";
365 $done->send;
366 },
367 );
368
369 # do something else, then wait for process exit
370 $done->recv;
371
372=head2 CONDITION VARIABLES
373
374If you are familiar with some event loops you will know that all of them
375require you to run some blocking "loop", "run" or similar function that
376will actively watch for new events and call your callbacks.
377
378AnyEvent is different, it expects somebody else to run the event loop and
379will only block when necessary (usually when told by the user).
380
381The instrument to do that is called a "condition variable", so called
382because they represent a condition that must become true.
383
384Condition variables can be created by calling the C<< AnyEvent->condvar
385>> method, usually without arguments. The only argument pair allowed is
386C<cb>, which specifies a callback to be called when the condition variable
387becomes true.
388
389After creation, the condition variable is "false" until it becomes "true"
390by calling the C<send> method (or calling the condition variable as if it
391were a callback, read about the caveats in the description for the C<<
392->send >> method).
393
394Condition variables are similar to callbacks, except that you can
395optionally wait for them. They can also be called merge points - points
396in time where multiple outstanding events have been processed. And yet
397another way to call them is transactions - each condition variable can be
398used to represent a transaction, which finishes at some point and delivers
399a result.
400
401Condition variables are very useful to signal that something has finished,
402for example, if you write a module that does asynchronous http requests,
403then a condition variable would be the ideal candidate to signal the
404availability of results. The user can either act when the callback is
405called or can synchronously C<< ->recv >> for the results.
406
407You can also use them to simulate traditional event loops - for example,
408you can block your main program until an event occurs - for example, you
409could C<< ->recv >> in your main program until the user clicks the Quit
410button of your app, which would C<< ->send >> the "quit" event.
411
412Note that condition variables recurse into the event loop - if you have
413two pieces of code that call C<< ->recv >> in a round-robin fashion, you
414lose. Therefore, condition variables are good to export to your caller, but
415you should avoid making a blocking wait yourself, at least in callbacks,
416as this asks for trouble.
417
418Condition variables are represented by hash refs in perl, and the keys
419used by AnyEvent itself are all named C<_ae_XXX> to make subclassing
420easy (it is often useful to build your own transaction class on top of
421AnyEvent). To subclass, use C<AnyEvent::CondVar> as base class and call
422it's C<new> method in your own C<new> method.
423
424There are two "sides" to a condition variable - the "producer side" which
425eventually calls C<< -> send >>, and the "consumer side", which waits
426for the send to occur.
427
428Example: wait for a timer.
429
430 # wait till the result is ready
431 my $result_ready = AnyEvent->condvar;
432
433 # do something such as adding a timer
434 # or socket watcher the calls $result_ready->send
435 # when the "result" is ready.
436 # in this case, we simply use a timer:
437 my $w = AnyEvent->timer (
438 after => 1,
439 cb => sub { $result_ready->send },
440 );
441
442 # this "blocks" (while handling events) till the callback
443 # calls send
444 $result_ready->recv;
445
446Example: wait for a timer, but take advantage of the fact that
447condition variables are also code references.
448
449 my $done = AnyEvent->condvar;
450 my $delay = AnyEvent->timer (after => 5, cb => $done);
451 $done->recv;
452
453=head3 METHODS FOR PRODUCERS
454
455These methods should only be used by the producing side, i.e. the
456code/module that eventually sends the signal. Note that it is also
457the producer side which creates the condvar in most cases, but it isn't
458uncommon for the consumer to create it as well.
459
460=over 4
461
462=item $cv->send (...)
463
464Flag the condition as ready - a running C<< ->recv >> and all further
465calls to C<recv> will (eventually) return after this method has been
466called. If nobody is waiting the send will be remembered.
467
468If a callback has been set on the condition variable, it is called
469immediately from within send.
470
471Any arguments passed to the C<send> call will be returned by all
472future C<< ->recv >> calls.
473
474Condition variables are overloaded so one can call them directly
475(as a code reference). Calling them directly is the same as calling
476C<send>. Note, however, that many C-based event loops do not handle
477overloading, so as tempting as it may be, passing a condition variable
478instead of a callback does not work. Both the pure perl and EV loops
479support overloading, however, as well as all functions that use perl to
480invoke a callback (as in L<AnyEvent::Socket> and L<AnyEvent::DNS> for
481example).
482
483=item $cv->croak ($error)
484
485Similar to send, but causes all call's to C<< ->recv >> to invoke
486C<Carp::croak> with the given error message/object/scalar.
487
488This can be used to signal any errors to the condition variable
489user/consumer.
490
491=item $cv->begin ([group callback])
492
493=item $cv->end
494
495These two methods are EXPERIMENTAL and MIGHT CHANGE.
496
497These two methods can be used to combine many transactions/events into
498one. For example, a function that pings many hosts in parallel might want
499to use a condition variable for the whole process.
500
501Every call to C<< ->begin >> will increment a counter, and every call to
502C<< ->end >> will decrement it. If the counter reaches C<0> in C<< ->end
503>>, the (last) callback passed to C<begin> will be executed. That callback
504is I<supposed> to call C<< ->send >>, but that is not required. If no
505callback was set, C<send> will be called without any arguments.
506
507Let's clarify this with the ping example:
508
509 my $cv = AnyEvent->condvar;
510
511 my %result;
512 $cv->begin (sub { $cv->send (\%result) });
513
514 for my $host (@list_of_hosts) {
515 $cv->begin;
516 ping_host_then_call_callback $host, sub {
517 $result{$host} = ...;
518 $cv->end;
519 };
520 }
521
522 $cv->end;
523
524This code fragment supposedly pings a number of hosts and calls
525C<send> after results for all then have have been gathered - in any
526order. To achieve this, the code issues a call to C<begin> when it starts
527each ping request and calls C<end> when it has received some result for
528it. Since C<begin> and C<end> only maintain a counter, the order in which
529results arrive is not relevant.
530
531There is an additional bracketing call to C<begin> and C<end> outside the
532loop, which serves two important purposes: first, it sets the callback
533to be called once the counter reaches C<0>, and second, it ensures that
534C<send> is called even when C<no> hosts are being pinged (the loop
535doesn't execute once).
536
537This is the general pattern when you "fan out" into multiple subrequests:
538use an outer C<begin>/C<end> pair to set the callback and ensure C<end>
539is called at least once, and then, for each subrequest you start, call
540C<begin> and for each subrequest you finish, call C<end>.
541
542=back
543
544=head3 METHODS FOR CONSUMERS
545
546These methods should only be used by the consuming side, i.e. the
547code awaits the condition.
548
549=over 4
550
551=item $cv->recv
552
553Wait (blocking if necessary) until the C<< ->send >> or C<< ->croak
554>> methods have been called on c<$cv>, while servicing other watchers
555normally.
556
557You can only wait once on a condition - additional calls are valid but
558will return immediately.
559
560If an error condition has been set by calling C<< ->croak >>, then this
561function will call C<croak>.
562
563In list context, all parameters passed to C<send> will be returned,
564in scalar context only the first one will be returned.
565
566Not all event models support a blocking wait - some die in that case
567(programs might want to do that to stay interactive), so I<if you are
568using this from a module, never require a blocking wait>, but let the
569caller decide whether the call will block or not (for example, by coupling
570condition variables with some kind of request results and supporting
571callbacks so the caller knows that getting the result will not block,
572while still supporting blocking waits if the caller so desires).
573
574Another reason I<never> to C<< ->recv >> in a module is that you cannot
575sensibly have two C<< ->recv >>'s in parallel, as that would require
576multiple interpreters or coroutines/threads, none of which C<AnyEvent>
577can supply.
578
579The L<Coro> module, however, I<can> and I<does> supply coroutines and, in
580fact, L<Coro::AnyEvent> replaces AnyEvent's condvars by coroutine-safe
581versions and also integrates coroutines into AnyEvent, making blocking
582C<< ->recv >> calls perfectly safe as long as they are done from another
583coroutine (one that doesn't run the event loop).
584
585You can ensure that C<< -recv >> never blocks by setting a callback and
586only calling C<< ->recv >> from within that callback (or at a later
587time). This will work even when the event loop does not support blocking
588waits otherwise.
589
590=item $bool = $cv->ready
591
592Returns true when the condition is "true", i.e. whether C<send> or
593C<croak> have been called.
594
595=item $cb = $cv->cb ([new callback])
596
597This is a mutator function that returns the callback set and optionally
598replaces it before doing so.
599
600The callback will be called when the condition becomes "true", i.e. when
601C<send> or C<croak> are called, with the only argument being the condition
602variable itself. Calling C<recv> inside the callback or at any later time
603is guaranteed not to block.
604
605=back
606
607=head1 GLOBAL VARIABLES AND FUNCTIONS
608
609=over 4
610
611=item $AnyEvent::MODEL
612
613Contains C<undef> until the first watcher is being created. Then it
614contains the event model that is being used, which is the name of the
615Perl class implementing the model. This class is usually one of the
616C<AnyEvent::Impl:xxx> modules, but can be any other class in the case
617AnyEvent has been extended at runtime (e.g. in I<rxvt-unicode>).
618
619The known classes so far are:
620
621 AnyEvent::Impl::EV based on EV (an interface to libev, best choice).
622 AnyEvent::Impl::Event based on Event, second best choice.
623 AnyEvent::Impl::Perl pure-perl implementation, fast and portable.
624 AnyEvent::Impl::Glib based on Glib, third-best choice.
625 AnyEvent::Impl::Tk based on Tk, very bad choice.
626 AnyEvent::Impl::Qt based on Qt, cannot be autoprobed (see its docs).
627 AnyEvent::Impl::EventLib based on Event::Lib, leaks memory and worse.
628 AnyEvent::Impl::POE based on POE, not generic enough for full support.
629
630There is no support for WxWidgets, as WxWidgets has no support for
631watching file handles. However, you can use WxWidgets through the
632POE Adaptor, as POE has a Wx backend that simply polls 20 times per
633second, which was considered to be too horrible to even consider for
634AnyEvent. Likewise, other POE backends can be used by AnyEvent by using
635it's adaptor.
636
637AnyEvent knows about L<Prima> and L<Wx> and will try to use L<POE> when
638autodetecting them.
639
640=item AnyEvent::detect
641
642Returns C<$AnyEvent::MODEL>, forcing autodetection of the event model
643if necessary. You should only call this function right before you would
644have created an AnyEvent watcher anyway, that is, as late as possible at
645runtime.
646
647=item $guard = AnyEvent::post_detect { BLOCK }
648
649Arranges for the code block to be executed as soon as the event model is
650autodetected (or immediately if this has already happened).
651
652If called in scalar or list context, then it creates and returns an object
653that automatically removes the callback again when it is destroyed. See
654L<Coro::BDB> for a case where this is useful.
655
656=item @AnyEvent::post_detect
657
658If there are any code references in this array (you can C<push> to it
659before or after loading AnyEvent), then they will called directly after
660the event loop has been chosen.
661
662You should check C<$AnyEvent::MODEL> before adding to this array, though:
663if it contains a true value then the event loop has already been detected,
664and the array will be ignored.
665
666Best use C<AnyEvent::post_detect { BLOCK }> instead.
667
668=back
669
670=head1 WHAT TO DO IN A MODULE
671
672As a module author, you should C<use AnyEvent> and call AnyEvent methods
673freely, but you should not load a specific event module or rely on it.
674
675Be careful when you create watchers in the module body - AnyEvent will
676decide which event module to use as soon as the first method is called, so
677by calling AnyEvent in your module body you force the user of your module
678to load the event module first.
679
680Never call C<< ->recv >> on a condition variable unless you I<know> that
681the C<< ->send >> method has been called on it already. This is
682because it will stall the whole program, and the whole point of using
683events is to stay interactive.
684
685It is fine, however, to call C<< ->recv >> when the user of your module
686requests it (i.e. if you create a http request object ad have a method
687called C<results> that returns the results, it should call C<< ->recv >>
688freely, as the user of your module knows what she is doing. always).
689
690=head1 WHAT TO DO IN THE MAIN PROGRAM
691
692There will always be a single main program - the only place that should
693dictate which event model to use.
694
695If it doesn't care, it can just "use AnyEvent" and use it itself, or not
696do anything special (it does not need to be event-based) and let AnyEvent
697decide which implementation to chose if some module relies on it.
698
699If the main program relies on a specific event model - for example, in
700Gtk2 programs you have to rely on the Glib module - you should load the
701event module before loading AnyEvent or any module that uses it: generally
702speaking, you should load it as early as possible. The reason is that
703modules might create watchers when they are loaded, and AnyEvent will
704decide on the event model to use as soon as it creates watchers, and it
705might chose the wrong one unless you load the correct one yourself.
706
707You can chose to use a pure-perl implementation by loading the
708C<AnyEvent::Impl::Perl> module, which gives you similar behaviour
709everywhere, but letting AnyEvent chose the model is generally better.
710
711=head2 MAINLOOP EMULATION
712
713Sometimes (often for short test scripts, or even standalone programs who
714only want to use AnyEvent), you do not want to run a specific event loop.
715
716In that case, you can use a condition variable like this:
717
718 AnyEvent->condvar->recv;
719
720This has the effect of entering the event loop and looping forever.
721
722Note that usually your program has some exit condition, in which case
723it is better to use the "traditional" approach of storing a condition
724variable somewhere, waiting for it, and sending it when the program should
725exit cleanly.
726
727
728=head1 OTHER MODULES
729
730The following is a non-exhaustive list of additional modules that use
731AnyEvent and can therefore be mixed easily with other AnyEvent modules
732in the same program. Some of the modules come with AnyEvent, some are
733available via CPAN.
734
735=over 4
736
737=item L<AnyEvent::Util>
738
739Contains various utility functions that replace often-used but blocking
740functions such as C<inet_aton> by event-/callback-based versions.
741
742=item L<AnyEvent::Socket>
743
744Provides various utility functions for (internet protocol) sockets,
745addresses and name resolution. Also functions to create non-blocking tcp
746connections or tcp servers, with IPv6 and SRV record support and more.
747
748=item L<AnyEvent::Handle>
749
750Provide read and write buffers, manages watchers for reads and writes,
751supports raw and formatted I/O, I/O queued and fully transparent and
752non-blocking SSL/TLS.
753
754=item L<AnyEvent::DNS>
755
756Provides rich asynchronous DNS resolver capabilities.
757
758=item L<AnyEvent::HTTP>
759
760A simple-to-use HTTP library that is capable of making a lot of concurrent
761HTTP requests.
762
763=item L<AnyEvent::HTTPD>
764
765Provides a simple web application server framework.
766
767=item L<AnyEvent::FastPing>
768
769The fastest ping in the west.
770
771=item L<AnyEvent::DBI>
772
773Executes L<DBI> requests asynchronously in a proxy process.
774
775=item L<AnyEvent::AIO>
776
777Truly asynchronous I/O, should be in the toolbox of every event
778programmer. AnyEvent::AIO transparently fuses L<IO::AIO> and AnyEvent
779together.
780
781=item L<AnyEvent::BDB>
782
783Truly asynchronous Berkeley DB access. AnyEvent::BDB transparently fuses
784L<BDB> and AnyEvent together.
785
786=item L<AnyEvent::GPSD>
787
788A non-blocking interface to gpsd, a daemon delivering GPS information.
789
790=item L<AnyEvent::IGS>
791
792A non-blocking interface to the Internet Go Server protocol (used by
793L<App::IGS>).
794
795=item L<Net::IRC3>
796
797AnyEvent based IRC client module family.
798
799=item L<Net::XMPP2>
800
801AnyEvent based XMPP (Jabber protocol) module family.
802
803=item L<Net::FCP>
804
805AnyEvent-based implementation of the Freenet Client Protocol, birthplace
806of AnyEvent.
807
808=item L<Event::ExecFlow>
809
810High level API for event-based execution flow control.
811
812=item L<Coro>
813
814Has special support for AnyEvent via L<Coro::AnyEvent>.
815
816=item L<IO::Lambda>
817
818The lambda approach to I/O - don't ask, look there. Can use AnyEvent.
819
820=back
821
59=cut 822=cut
60 823
61package AnyEvent; 824package AnyEvent;
62 825
63no warnings; 826no warnings;
64use strict 'vars'; 827use strict;
828
65use Carp; 829use Carp;
66 830
67our $VERSION = 0.3; 831our $VERSION = 4.22;
68our $MODEL; 832our $MODEL;
69 833
70our $AUTOLOAD; 834our $AUTOLOAD;
71our @ISA; 835our @ISA;
72 836
837our @REGISTRY;
838
839our $WIN32;
840
841BEGIN {
842 my $win32 = ! ! ($^O =~ /mswin32/i);
843 eval "sub WIN32(){ $win32 }";
844}
845
846our $verbose = $ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_VERBOSE}*1;
847
848our %PROTOCOL; # (ipv4|ipv6) => (1|2), higher numbers are preferred
849
850{
851 my $idx;
852 $PROTOCOL{$_} = ++$idx
853 for reverse split /\s*,\s*/,
854 $ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_PROTOCOLS} || "ipv4,ipv6";
855}
856
73my @models = ( 857my @models = (
74 [Coro => Coro::Event::], 858 [EV:: => AnyEvent::Impl::EV::],
75 [Event => Event::], 859 [Event:: => AnyEvent::Impl::Event::],
76 [Glib => Glib::], 860 [AnyEvent::Impl::Perl:: => AnyEvent::Impl::Perl::],
77 [Tk => Tk::], 861 # everything below here will not be autoprobed
862 # as the pureperl backend should work everywhere
863 # and is usually faster
864 [Tk:: => AnyEvent::Impl::Tk::], # crashes with many handles
865 [Glib:: => AnyEvent::Impl::Glib::], # becomes extremely slow with many watchers
866 [Event::Lib:: => AnyEvent::Impl::EventLib::], # too buggy
867 [Qt:: => AnyEvent::Impl::Qt::], # requires special main program
868 [POE::Kernel:: => AnyEvent::Impl::POE::], # lasciate ogni speranza
869 [Wx:: => AnyEvent::Impl::POE::],
870 [Prima:: => AnyEvent::Impl::POE::],
78); 871);
79 872
80our %method = map +($_ => 1), qw(io timer condvar broadcast wait cancel DESTROY); 873our %method = map +($_ => 1), qw(io timer time now signal child condvar one_event DESTROY);
81 874
82sub AUTOLOAD { 875our @post_detect;
83 $AUTOLOAD =~ s/.*://;
84 876
85 $method{$AUTOLOAD} 877sub post_detect(&) {
86 or croak "$AUTOLOAD: not a valid method for AnyEvent objects"; 878 my ($cb) = @_;
87 879
880 if ($MODEL) {
881 $cb->();
882
883 1
884 } else {
885 push @post_detect, $cb;
886
887 defined wantarray
888 ? bless \$cb, "AnyEvent::Util::PostDetect"
889 : ()
890 }
891}
892
893sub AnyEvent::Util::PostDetect::DESTROY {
894 @post_detect = grep $_ != ${$_[0]}, @post_detect;
895}
896
897sub detect() {
88 unless ($MODEL) { 898 unless ($MODEL) {
89 # check for already loaded models 899 no strict 'refs';
90 for (@models) { 900 local $SIG{__DIE__};
91 my ($model, $package) = @$_; 901
92 if (scalar keys %{ *{"$package\::"} }) { 902 if ($ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_MODEL} =~ /^([a-zA-Z]+)$/) {
93 eval "require AnyEvent::Impl::$model"; 903 my $model = "AnyEvent::Impl::$1";
94 last if $MODEL; 904 if (eval "require $model") {
905 $MODEL = $model;
906 warn "AnyEvent: loaded model '$model' (forced by \$PERL_ANYEVENT_MODEL), using it.\n" if $verbose > 1;
907 } else {
908 warn "AnyEvent: unable to load model '$model' (from \$PERL_ANYEVENT_MODEL):\n$@" if $verbose;
95 } 909 }
96 } 910 }
97 911
912 # check for already loaded models
98 unless ($MODEL) { 913 unless ($MODEL) {
99 # try to load a model
100
101 for (@models) { 914 for (@REGISTRY, @models) {
102 my ($model, $package) = @$_; 915 my ($package, $model) = @$_;
103 eval "require AnyEvent::Impl::$model"; 916 if (${"$package\::VERSION"} > 0) {
104 last if $MODEL; 917 if (eval "require $model") {
918 $MODEL = $model;
919 warn "AnyEvent: autodetected model '$model', using it.\n" if $verbose > 1;
920 last;
921 }
922 }
105 } 923 }
106 924
925 unless ($MODEL) {
926 # try to load a model
927
928 for (@REGISTRY, @models) {
929 my ($package, $model) = @$_;
930 if (eval "require $package"
931 and ${"$package\::VERSION"} > 0
932 and eval "require $model") {
933 $MODEL = $model;
934 warn "AnyEvent: autoprobed model '$model', using it.\n" if $verbose > 1;
935 last;
936 }
937 }
938
107 $MODEL 939 $MODEL
108 or die "No event module selected for AnyEvent and autodetect failed. Install any one of these modules: Coro, Event, Glib or Tk."; 940 or die "No event module selected for AnyEvent and autodetect failed. Install any one of these modules: EV, Event or Glib.";
941 }
109 } 942 }
943
944 push @{"$MODEL\::ISA"}, "AnyEvent::Base";
945
946 unshift @ISA, $MODEL;
947
948 require AnyEvent::Strict if $ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_STRICT};
949
950 (shift @post_detect)->() while @post_detect;
110 } 951 }
111 952
112 @ISA = $MODEL; 953 $MODEL
954}
955
956sub AUTOLOAD {
957 (my $func = $AUTOLOAD) =~ s/.*://;
958
959 $method{$func}
960 or croak "$func: not a valid method for AnyEvent objects";
961
962 detect unless $MODEL;
113 963
114 my $class = shift; 964 my $class = shift;
115 $class->$AUTOLOAD (@_); 965 $class->$func (@_);
116} 966}
967
968# utility function to dup a filehandle. this is used by many backends
969# to support binding more than one watcher per filehandle (they usually
970# allow only one watcher per fd, so we dup it to get a different one).
971sub _dupfh($$$$) {
972 my ($poll, $fh, $r, $w) = @_;
973
974 require Fcntl;
975
976 # cygwin requires the fh mode to be matching, unix doesn't
977 my ($rw, $mode) = $poll eq "r" ? ($r, "<")
978 : $poll eq "w" ? ($w, ">")
979 : Carp::croak "AnyEvent->io requires poll set to either 'r' or 'w'";
980
981 open my $fh2, "$mode&" . fileno $fh
982 or die "cannot dup() filehandle: $!";
983
984 # we assume CLOEXEC is already set by perl in all important cases
985
986 ($fh2, $rw)
987}
988
989package AnyEvent::Base;
990
991# default implementation for now and time
992
993use Time::HiRes ();
994
995sub time { Time::HiRes::time }
996sub now { Time::HiRes::time }
997
998# default implementation for ->condvar
999
1000sub condvar {
1001 bless { @_ == 3 ? (_ae_cb => $_[2]) : () }, AnyEvent::CondVar::
1002}
1003
1004# default implementation for ->signal
1005
1006our %SIG_CB;
1007
1008sub signal {
1009 my (undef, %arg) = @_;
1010
1011 my $signal = uc $arg{signal}
1012 or Carp::croak "required option 'signal' is missing";
1013
1014 $SIG_CB{$signal}{$arg{cb}} = $arg{cb};
1015 $SIG{$signal} ||= sub {
1016 $_->() for values %{ $SIG_CB{$signal} || {} };
1017 };
1018
1019 bless [$signal, $arg{cb}], "AnyEvent::Base::Signal"
1020}
1021
1022sub AnyEvent::Base::Signal::DESTROY {
1023 my ($signal, $cb) = @{$_[0]};
1024
1025 delete $SIG_CB{$signal}{$cb};
1026
1027 delete $SIG{$signal} unless keys %{ $SIG_CB{$signal} };
1028}
1029
1030# default implementation for ->child
1031
1032our %PID_CB;
1033our $CHLD_W;
1034our $CHLD_DELAY_W;
1035our $PID_IDLE;
1036our $WNOHANG;
1037
1038sub _child_wait {
1039 while (0 < (my $pid = waitpid -1, $WNOHANG)) {
1040 $_->($pid, $?) for (values %{ $PID_CB{$pid} || {} }),
1041 (values %{ $PID_CB{0} || {} });
1042 }
1043
1044 undef $PID_IDLE;
1045}
1046
1047sub _sigchld {
1048 # make sure we deliver these changes "synchronous" with the event loop.
1049 $CHLD_DELAY_W ||= AnyEvent->timer (after => 0, cb => sub {
1050 undef $CHLD_DELAY_W;
1051 &_child_wait;
1052 });
1053}
1054
1055sub child {
1056 my (undef, %arg) = @_;
1057
1058 defined (my $pid = $arg{pid} + 0)
1059 or Carp::croak "required option 'pid' is missing";
1060
1061 $PID_CB{$pid}{$arg{cb}} = $arg{cb};
1062
1063 unless ($WNOHANG) {
1064 $WNOHANG = eval { local $SIG{__DIE__}; require POSIX; &POSIX::WNOHANG } || 1;
1065 }
1066
1067 unless ($CHLD_W) {
1068 $CHLD_W = AnyEvent->signal (signal => 'CHLD', cb => \&_sigchld);
1069 # child could be a zombie already, so make at least one round
1070 &_sigchld;
1071 }
1072
1073 bless [$pid, $arg{cb}], "AnyEvent::Base::Child"
1074}
1075
1076sub AnyEvent::Base::Child::DESTROY {
1077 my ($pid, $cb) = @{$_[0]};
1078
1079 delete $PID_CB{$pid}{$cb};
1080 delete $PID_CB{$pid} unless keys %{ $PID_CB{$pid} };
1081
1082 undef $CHLD_W unless keys %PID_CB;
1083}
1084
1085package AnyEvent::CondVar;
1086
1087our @ISA = AnyEvent::CondVar::Base::;
1088
1089package AnyEvent::CondVar::Base;
1090
1091use overload
1092 '&{}' => sub { my $self = shift; sub { $self->send (@_) } },
1093 fallback => 1;
1094
1095sub _send {
1096 # nop
1097}
1098
1099sub send {
1100 my $cv = shift;
1101 $cv->{_ae_sent} = [@_];
1102 (delete $cv->{_ae_cb})->($cv) if $cv->{_ae_cb};
1103 $cv->_send;
1104}
1105
1106sub croak {
1107 $_[0]{_ae_croak} = $_[1];
1108 $_[0]->send;
1109}
1110
1111sub ready {
1112 $_[0]{_ae_sent}
1113}
1114
1115sub _wait {
1116 AnyEvent->one_event while !$_[0]{_ae_sent};
1117}
1118
1119sub recv {
1120 $_[0]->_wait;
1121
1122 Carp::croak $_[0]{_ae_croak} if $_[0]{_ae_croak};
1123 wantarray ? @{ $_[0]{_ae_sent} } : $_[0]{_ae_sent}[0]
1124}
1125
1126sub cb {
1127 $_[0]{_ae_cb} = $_[1] if @_ > 1;
1128 $_[0]{_ae_cb}
1129}
1130
1131sub begin {
1132 ++$_[0]{_ae_counter};
1133 $_[0]{_ae_end_cb} = $_[1] if @_ > 1;
1134}
1135
1136sub end {
1137 return if --$_[0]{_ae_counter};
1138 &{ $_[0]{_ae_end_cb} || sub { $_[0]->send } };
1139}
1140
1141# undocumented/compatibility with pre-3.4
1142*broadcast = \&send;
1143*wait = \&_wait;
1144
1145=head1 SUPPLYING YOUR OWN EVENT MODEL INTERFACE
1146
1147This is an advanced topic that you do not normally need to use AnyEvent in
1148a module. This section is only of use to event loop authors who want to
1149provide AnyEvent compatibility.
1150
1151If you need to support another event library which isn't directly
1152supported by AnyEvent, you can supply your own interface to it by
1153pushing, before the first watcher gets created, the package name of
1154the event module and the package name of the interface to use onto
1155C<@AnyEvent::REGISTRY>. You can do that before and even without loading
1156AnyEvent, so it is reasonably cheap.
1157
1158Example:
1159
1160 push @AnyEvent::REGISTRY, [urxvt => urxvt::anyevent::];
1161
1162This tells AnyEvent to (literally) use the C<urxvt::anyevent::>
1163package/class when it finds the C<urxvt> package/module is already loaded.
1164
1165When AnyEvent is loaded and asked to find a suitable event model, it
1166will first check for the presence of urxvt by trying to C<use> the
1167C<urxvt::anyevent> module.
1168
1169The class should provide implementations for all watcher types. See
1170L<AnyEvent::Impl::EV> (source code), L<AnyEvent::Impl::Glib> (Source code)
1171and so on for actual examples. Use C<perldoc -m AnyEvent::Impl::Glib> to
1172see the sources.
1173
1174If you don't provide C<signal> and C<child> watchers than AnyEvent will
1175provide suitable (hopefully) replacements.
1176
1177The above example isn't fictitious, the I<rxvt-unicode> (a.k.a. urxvt)
1178terminal emulator uses the above line as-is. An interface isn't included
1179in AnyEvent because it doesn't make sense outside the embedded interpreter
1180inside I<rxvt-unicode>, and it is updated and maintained as part of the
1181I<rxvt-unicode> distribution.
1182
1183I<rxvt-unicode> also cheats a bit by not providing blocking access to
1184condition variables: code blocking while waiting for a condition will
1185C<die>. This still works with most modules/usages, and blocking calls must
1186not be done in an interactive application, so it makes sense.
1187
1188=head1 ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
1189
1190The following environment variables are used by this module:
1191
1192=over 4
1193
1194=item C<PERL_ANYEVENT_VERBOSE>
1195
1196By default, AnyEvent will be completely silent except in fatal
1197conditions. You can set this environment variable to make AnyEvent more
1198talkative.
1199
1200When set to C<1> or higher, causes AnyEvent to warn about unexpected
1201conditions, such as not being able to load the event model specified by
1202C<PERL_ANYEVENT_MODEL>.
1203
1204When set to C<2> or higher, cause AnyEvent to report to STDERR which event
1205model it chooses.
1206
1207=item C<PERL_ANYEVENT_STRICT>
1208
1209AnyEvent does not do much argument checking by default, as thorough
1210argument checking is very costly. Setting this variable to a true value
1211will cause AnyEvent to load C<AnyEvent::Strict> and then to thoroughly
1212check the arguments passed to most method calls. If it finds any problems
1213it will croak.
1214
1215In other words, enables "strict" mode.
1216
1217Unlike C<use strict> it is definitely recommended ot keep it off in
1218production.
1219
1220=item C<PERL_ANYEVENT_MODEL>
1221
1222This can be used to specify the event model to be used by AnyEvent, before
1223auto detection and -probing kicks in. It must be a string consisting
1224entirely of ASCII letters. The string C<AnyEvent::Impl::> gets prepended
1225and the resulting module name is loaded and if the load was successful,
1226used as event model. If it fails to load AnyEvent will proceed with
1227auto detection and -probing.
1228
1229This functionality might change in future versions.
1230
1231For example, to force the pure perl model (L<AnyEvent::Impl::Perl>) you
1232could start your program like this:
1233
1234 PERL_ANYEVENT_MODEL=Perl perl ...
1235
1236=item C<PERL_ANYEVENT_PROTOCOLS>
1237
1238Used by both L<AnyEvent::DNS> and L<AnyEvent::Socket> to determine preferences
1239for IPv4 or IPv6. The default is unspecified (and might change, or be the result
1240of auto probing).
1241
1242Must be set to a comma-separated list of protocols or address families,
1243current supported: C<ipv4> and C<ipv6>. Only protocols mentioned will be
1244used, and preference will be given to protocols mentioned earlier in the
1245list.
1246
1247This variable can effectively be used for denial-of-service attacks
1248against local programs (e.g. when setuid), although the impact is likely
1249small, as the program has to handle connection errors already-
1250
1251Examples: C<PERL_ANYEVENT_PROTOCOLS=ipv4,ipv6> - prefer IPv4 over IPv6,
1252but support both and try to use both. C<PERL_ANYEVENT_PROTOCOLS=ipv4>
1253- only support IPv4, never try to resolve or contact IPv6
1254addresses. C<PERL_ANYEVENT_PROTOCOLS=ipv6,ipv4> support either IPv4 or
1255IPv6, but prefer IPv6 over IPv4.
1256
1257=item C<PERL_ANYEVENT_EDNS0>
1258
1259Used by L<AnyEvent::DNS> to decide whether to use the EDNS0 extension
1260for DNS. This extension is generally useful to reduce DNS traffic, but
1261some (broken) firewalls drop such DNS packets, which is why it is off by
1262default.
1263
1264Setting this variable to C<1> will cause L<AnyEvent::DNS> to announce
1265EDNS0 in its DNS requests.
1266
1267=item C<PERL_ANYEVENT_MAX_FORKS>
1268
1269The maximum number of child processes that C<AnyEvent::Util::fork_call>
1270will create in parallel.
117 1271
118=back 1272=back
119 1273
120=head1 EXAMPLE 1274=head1 EXAMPLE PROGRAM
121 1275
122The following program uses an io watcher to read data from stdin, a timer 1276The following program uses an I/O watcher to read data from STDIN, a timer
123to display a message once per second, and a condvar to exit the program 1277to display a message once per second, and a condition variable to quit the
124when the user enters quit: 1278program when the user enters quit:
125 1279
126 use AnyEvent; 1280 use AnyEvent;
127 1281
128 my $cv = AnyEvent->condvar; 1282 my $cv = AnyEvent->condvar;
129 1283
130 my $io_watcher = AnyEvent->io (fh => \*STDIN, poll => 'r', cb => sub { 1284 my $io_watcher = AnyEvent->io (
1285 fh => \*STDIN,
1286 poll => 'r',
1287 cb => sub {
131 warn "io event <$_[0]>\n"; # will always output <r> 1288 warn "io event <$_[0]>\n"; # will always output <r>
132 chomp (my $input = <STDIN>); # read a line 1289 chomp (my $input = <STDIN>); # read a line
133 warn "read: $input\n"; # output what has been read 1290 warn "read: $input\n"; # output what has been read
134 $cv->broadcast if $input =~ /^q/i; # quit program if /^q/i 1291 $cv->send if $input =~ /^q/i; # quit program if /^q/i
1292 },
135 }); 1293 );
136 1294
137 my $time_watcher; # can only be used once 1295 my $time_watcher; # can only be used once
138 1296
139 sub new_timer { 1297 sub new_timer {
140 $timer = AnyEvent->timer (after => 1, cb => sub { 1298 $timer = AnyEvent->timer (after => 1, cb => sub {
143 }); 1301 });
144 } 1302 }
145 1303
146 new_timer; # create first timer 1304 new_timer; # create first timer
147 1305
148 $cv->wait; # wait until user enters /^q/i 1306 $cv->recv; # wait until user enters /^q/i
149 1307
150=head1 REAL-WORLD EXAMPLE 1308=head1 REAL-WORLD EXAMPLE
151 1309
152Consider the L<Net::FCP> module. It features (among others) the following 1310Consider the L<Net::FCP> module. It features (among others) the following
153API calls, which are to freenet what HTTP GET requests are to http: 1311API calls, which are to freenet what HTTP GET requests are to http:
203 syswrite $txn->{fh}, $txn->{request} 1361 syswrite $txn->{fh}, $txn->{request}
204 or die "connection or write error"; 1362 or die "connection or write error";
205 $txn->{w} = AnyEvent->io (fh => $txn->{fh}, poll => 'r', cb => sub { $txn->fh_ready_r }); 1363 $txn->{w} = AnyEvent->io (fh => $txn->{fh}, poll => 'r', cb => sub { $txn->fh_ready_r });
206 1364
207Again, C<fh_ready_r> waits till all data has arrived, and then stores the 1365Again, C<fh_ready_r> waits till all data has arrived, and then stores the
208result and signals any possible waiters that the request ahs finished: 1366result and signals any possible waiters that the request has finished:
209 1367
210 sysread $txn->{fh}, $txn->{buf}, length $txn->{$buf}; 1368 sysread $txn->{fh}, $txn->{buf}, length $txn->{$buf};
211 1369
212 if (end-of-file or data complete) { 1370 if (end-of-file or data complete) {
213 $txn->{result} = $txn->{buf}; 1371 $txn->{result} = $txn->{buf};
214 $txn->{finished}->broadcast; 1372 $txn->{finished}->send;
215 $txb->{cb}->($txn) of $txn->{cb}; # also call callback 1373 $txb->{cb}->($txn) of $txn->{cb}; # also call callback
216 } 1374 }
217 1375
218The C<result> method, finally, just waits for the finished signal (if the 1376The C<result> method, finally, just waits for the finished signal (if the
219request was already finished, it doesn't wait, of course, and returns the 1377request was already finished, it doesn't wait, of course, and returns the
220data: 1378data:
221 1379
222 $txn->{finished}->wait; 1380 $txn->{finished}->recv;
223 return $txn->{result}; 1381 return $txn->{result};
224 1382
225The actual code goes further and collects all errors (C<die>s, exceptions) 1383The actual code goes further and collects all errors (C<die>s, exceptions)
226that occured during request processing. The C<result> method detects 1384that occurred during request processing. The C<result> method detects
227wether an exception as thrown (it is stored inside the $txn object) 1385whether an exception as thrown (it is stored inside the $txn object)
228and just throws the exception, which means connection errors and other 1386and just throws the exception, which means connection errors and other
229problems get reported tot he code that tries to use the result, not in a 1387problems get reported tot he code that tries to use the result, not in a
230random callback. 1388random callback.
231 1389
232All of this enables the following usage styles: 1390All of this enables the following usage styles:
233 1391
2341. Blocking: 13921. Blocking:
235 1393
236 my $data = $fcp->client_get ($url); 1394 my $data = $fcp->client_get ($url);
237 1395
2382. Blocking, but parallelizing: 13962. Blocking, but running in parallel:
239 1397
240 my @datas = map $_->result, 1398 my @datas = map $_->result,
241 map $fcp->txn_client_get ($_), 1399 map $fcp->txn_client_get ($_),
242 @urls; 1400 @urls;
243 1401
244Both blocking examples work without the module user having to know 1402Both blocking examples work without the module user having to know
245anything about events. 1403anything about events.
246 1404
2473a. Event-based in a main program, using any support Event module: 14053a. Event-based in a main program, using any supported event module:
248 1406
249 use Event; 1407 use EV;
250 1408
251 $fcp->txn_client_get ($url)->cb (sub { 1409 $fcp->txn_client_get ($url)->cb (sub {
252 my $txn = shift; 1410 my $txn = shift;
253 my $data = $txn->result; 1411 my $data = $txn->result;
254 ... 1412 ...
255 }); 1413 });
256 1414
257 Event::loop; 1415 EV::loop;
258 1416
2593b. The module user could use AnyEvent, too: 14173b. The module user could use AnyEvent, too:
260 1418
261 use AnyEvent; 1419 use AnyEvent;
262 1420
263 my $quit = AnyEvent->condvar; 1421 my $quit = AnyEvent->condvar;
264 1422
265 $fcp->txn_client_get ($url)->cb (sub { 1423 $fcp->txn_client_get ($url)->cb (sub {
266 ... 1424 ...
267 $quit->broadcast; 1425 $quit->send;
268 }); 1426 });
269 1427
270 $quit->wait; 1428 $quit->recv;
1429
1430
1431=head1 BENCHMARKS
1432
1433To give you an idea of the performance and overheads that AnyEvent adds
1434over the event loops themselves and to give you an impression of the speed
1435of various event loops I prepared some benchmarks.
1436
1437=head2 BENCHMARKING ANYEVENT OVERHEAD
1438
1439Here is a benchmark of various supported event models used natively and
1440through AnyEvent. The benchmark creates a lot of timers (with a zero
1441timeout) and I/O watchers (watching STDOUT, a pty, to become writable,
1442which it is), lets them fire exactly once and destroys them again.
1443
1444Source code for this benchmark is found as F<eg/bench> in the AnyEvent
1445distribution.
1446
1447=head3 Explanation of the columns
1448
1449I<watcher> is the number of event watchers created/destroyed. Since
1450different event models feature vastly different performances, each event
1451loop was given a number of watchers so that overall runtime is acceptable
1452and similar between tested event loop (and keep them from crashing): Glib
1453would probably take thousands of years if asked to process the same number
1454of watchers as EV in this benchmark.
1455
1456I<bytes> is the number of bytes (as measured by the resident set size,
1457RSS) consumed by each watcher. This method of measuring captures both C
1458and Perl-based overheads.
1459
1460I<create> is the time, in microseconds (millionths of seconds), that it
1461takes to create a single watcher. The callback is a closure shared between
1462all watchers, to avoid adding memory overhead. That means closure creation
1463and memory usage is not included in the figures.
1464
1465I<invoke> is the time, in microseconds, used to invoke a simple
1466callback. The callback simply counts down a Perl variable and after it was
1467invoked "watcher" times, it would C<< ->send >> a condvar once to
1468signal the end of this phase.
1469
1470I<destroy> is the time, in microseconds, that it takes to destroy a single
1471watcher.
1472
1473=head3 Results
1474
1475 name watchers bytes create invoke destroy comment
1476 EV/EV 400000 244 0.56 0.46 0.31 EV native interface
1477 EV/Any 100000 244 2.50 0.46 0.29 EV + AnyEvent watchers
1478 CoroEV/Any 100000 244 2.49 0.44 0.29 coroutines + Coro::Signal
1479 Perl/Any 100000 513 4.92 0.87 1.12 pure perl implementation
1480 Event/Event 16000 516 31.88 31.30 0.85 Event native interface
1481 Event/Any 16000 590 35.75 31.42 1.08 Event + AnyEvent watchers
1482 Glib/Any 16000 1357 98.22 12.41 54.00 quadratic behaviour
1483 Tk/Any 2000 1860 26.97 67.98 14.00 SEGV with >> 2000 watchers
1484 POE/Event 2000 6644 108.64 736.02 14.73 via POE::Loop::Event
1485 POE/Select 2000 6343 94.13 809.12 565.96 via POE::Loop::Select
1486
1487=head3 Discussion
1488
1489The benchmark does I<not> measure scalability of the event loop very
1490well. For example, a select-based event loop (such as the pure perl one)
1491can never compete with an event loop that uses epoll when the number of
1492file descriptors grows high. In this benchmark, all events become ready at
1493the same time, so select/poll-based implementations get an unnatural speed
1494boost.
1495
1496Also, note that the number of watchers usually has a nonlinear effect on
1497overall speed, that is, creating twice as many watchers doesn't take twice
1498the time - usually it takes longer. This puts event loops tested with a
1499higher number of watchers at a disadvantage.
1500
1501To put the range of results into perspective, consider that on the
1502benchmark machine, handling an event takes roughly 1600 CPU cycles with
1503EV, 3100 CPU cycles with AnyEvent's pure perl loop and almost 3000000 CPU
1504cycles with POE.
1505
1506C<EV> is the sole leader regarding speed and memory use, which are both
1507maximal/minimal, respectively. Even when going through AnyEvent, it uses
1508far less memory than any other event loop and is still faster than Event
1509natively.
1510
1511The pure perl implementation is hit in a few sweet spots (both the
1512constant timeout and the use of a single fd hit optimisations in the perl
1513interpreter and the backend itself). Nevertheless this shows that it
1514adds very little overhead in itself. Like any select-based backend its
1515performance becomes really bad with lots of file descriptors (and few of
1516them active), of course, but this was not subject of this benchmark.
1517
1518The C<Event> module has a relatively high setup and callback invocation
1519cost, but overall scores in on the third place.
1520
1521C<Glib>'s memory usage is quite a bit higher, but it features a
1522faster callback invocation and overall ends up in the same class as
1523C<Event>. However, Glib scales extremely badly, doubling the number of
1524watchers increases the processing time by more than a factor of four,
1525making it completely unusable when using larger numbers of watchers
1526(note that only a single file descriptor was used in the benchmark, so
1527inefficiencies of C<poll> do not account for this).
1528
1529The C<Tk> adaptor works relatively well. The fact that it crashes with
1530more than 2000 watchers is a big setback, however, as correctness takes
1531precedence over speed. Nevertheless, its performance is surprising, as the
1532file descriptor is dup()ed for each watcher. This shows that the dup()
1533employed by some adaptors is not a big performance issue (it does incur a
1534hidden memory cost inside the kernel which is not reflected in the figures
1535above).
1536
1537C<POE>, regardless of underlying event loop (whether using its pure perl
1538select-based backend or the Event module, the POE-EV backend couldn't
1539be tested because it wasn't working) shows abysmal performance and
1540memory usage with AnyEvent: Watchers use almost 30 times as much memory
1541as EV watchers, and 10 times as much memory as Event (the high memory
1542requirements are caused by requiring a session for each watcher). Watcher
1543invocation speed is almost 900 times slower than with AnyEvent's pure perl
1544implementation.
1545
1546The design of the POE adaptor class in AnyEvent can not really account
1547for the performance issues, though, as session creation overhead is
1548small compared to execution of the state machine, which is coded pretty
1549optimally within L<AnyEvent::Impl::POE> (and while everybody agrees that
1550using multiple sessions is not a good approach, especially regarding
1551memory usage, even the author of POE could not come up with a faster
1552design).
1553
1554=head3 Summary
1555
1556=over 4
1557
1558=item * Using EV through AnyEvent is faster than any other event loop
1559(even when used without AnyEvent), but most event loops have acceptable
1560performance with or without AnyEvent.
1561
1562=item * The overhead AnyEvent adds is usually much smaller than the overhead of
1563the actual event loop, only with extremely fast event loops such as EV
1564adds AnyEvent significant overhead.
1565
1566=item * You should avoid POE like the plague if you want performance or
1567reasonable memory usage.
1568
1569=back
1570
1571=head2 BENCHMARKING THE LARGE SERVER CASE
1572
1573This benchmark actually benchmarks the event loop itself. It works by
1574creating a number of "servers": each server consists of a socket pair, a
1575timeout watcher that gets reset on activity (but never fires), and an I/O
1576watcher waiting for input on one side of the socket. Each time the socket
1577watcher reads a byte it will write that byte to a random other "server".
1578
1579The effect is that there will be a lot of I/O watchers, only part of which
1580are active at any one point (so there is a constant number of active
1581fds for each loop iteration, but which fds these are is random). The
1582timeout is reset each time something is read because that reflects how
1583most timeouts work (and puts extra pressure on the event loops).
1584
1585In this benchmark, we use 10000 socket pairs (20000 sockets), of which 100
1586(1%) are active. This mirrors the activity of large servers with many
1587connections, most of which are idle at any one point in time.
1588
1589Source code for this benchmark is found as F<eg/bench2> in the AnyEvent
1590distribution.
1591
1592=head3 Explanation of the columns
1593
1594I<sockets> is the number of sockets, and twice the number of "servers" (as
1595each server has a read and write socket end).
1596
1597I<create> is the time it takes to create a socket pair (which is
1598nontrivial) and two watchers: an I/O watcher and a timeout watcher.
1599
1600I<request>, the most important value, is the time it takes to handle a
1601single "request", that is, reading the token from the pipe and forwarding
1602it to another server. This includes deleting the old timeout and creating
1603a new one that moves the timeout into the future.
1604
1605=head3 Results
1606
1607 name sockets create request
1608 EV 20000 69.01 11.16
1609 Perl 20000 73.32 35.87
1610 Event 20000 212.62 257.32
1611 Glib 20000 651.16 1896.30
1612 POE 20000 349.67 12317.24 uses POE::Loop::Event
1613
1614=head3 Discussion
1615
1616This benchmark I<does> measure scalability and overall performance of the
1617particular event loop.
1618
1619EV is again fastest. Since it is using epoll on my system, the setup time
1620is relatively high, though.
1621
1622Perl surprisingly comes second. It is much faster than the C-based event
1623loops Event and Glib.
1624
1625Event suffers from high setup time as well (look at its code and you will
1626understand why). Callback invocation also has a high overhead compared to
1627the C<< $_->() for .. >>-style loop that the Perl event loop uses. Event
1628uses select or poll in basically all documented configurations.
1629
1630Glib is hit hard by its quadratic behaviour w.r.t. many watchers. It
1631clearly fails to perform with many filehandles or in busy servers.
1632
1633POE is still completely out of the picture, taking over 1000 times as long
1634as EV, and over 100 times as long as the Perl implementation, even though
1635it uses a C-based event loop in this case.
1636
1637=head3 Summary
1638
1639=over 4
1640
1641=item * The pure perl implementation performs extremely well.
1642
1643=item * Avoid Glib or POE in large projects where performance matters.
1644
1645=back
1646
1647=head2 BENCHMARKING SMALL SERVERS
1648
1649While event loops should scale (and select-based ones do not...) even to
1650large servers, most programs we (or I :) actually write have only a few
1651I/O watchers.
1652
1653In this benchmark, I use the same benchmark program as in the large server
1654case, but it uses only eight "servers", of which three are active at any
1655one time. This should reflect performance for a small server relatively
1656well.
1657
1658The columns are identical to the previous table.
1659
1660=head3 Results
1661
1662 name sockets create request
1663 EV 16 20.00 6.54
1664 Perl 16 25.75 12.62
1665 Event 16 81.27 35.86
1666 Glib 16 32.63 15.48
1667 POE 16 261.87 276.28 uses POE::Loop::Event
1668
1669=head3 Discussion
1670
1671The benchmark tries to test the performance of a typical small
1672server. While knowing how various event loops perform is interesting, keep
1673in mind that their overhead in this case is usually not as important, due
1674to the small absolute number of watchers (that is, you need efficiency and
1675speed most when you have lots of watchers, not when you only have a few of
1676them).
1677
1678EV is again fastest.
1679
1680Perl again comes second. It is noticeably faster than the C-based event
1681loops Event and Glib, although the difference is too small to really
1682matter.
1683
1684POE also performs much better in this case, but is is still far behind the
1685others.
1686
1687=head3 Summary
1688
1689=over 4
1690
1691=item * C-based event loops perform very well with small number of
1692watchers, as the management overhead dominates.
1693
1694=back
1695
1696
1697=head1 FORK
1698
1699Most event libraries are not fork-safe. The ones who are usually are
1700because they rely on inefficient but fork-safe C<select> or C<poll>
1701calls. Only L<EV> is fully fork-aware.
1702
1703If you have to fork, you must either do so I<before> creating your first
1704watcher OR you must not use AnyEvent at all in the child.
1705
1706
1707=head1 SECURITY CONSIDERATIONS
1708
1709AnyEvent can be forced to load any event model via
1710$ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_MODEL}. While this cannot (to my knowledge) be used to
1711execute arbitrary code or directly gain access, it can easily be used to
1712make the program hang or malfunction in subtle ways, as AnyEvent watchers
1713will not be active when the program uses a different event model than
1714specified in the variable.
1715
1716You can make AnyEvent completely ignore this variable by deleting it
1717before the first watcher gets created, e.g. with a C<BEGIN> block:
1718
1719 BEGIN { delete $ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_MODEL} }
1720
1721 use AnyEvent;
1722
1723Similar considerations apply to $ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_VERBOSE}, as that can
1724be used to probe what backend is used and gain other information (which is
1725probably even less useful to an attacker than PERL_ANYEVENT_MODEL), and
1726$ENV{PERL_ANYEGENT_STRICT}.
1727
1728
1729=head1 BUGS
1730
1731Perl 5.8 has numerous memleaks that sometimes hit this module and are hard
1732to work around. If you suffer from memleaks, first upgrade to Perl 5.10
1733and check wether the leaks still show up. (Perl 5.10.0 has other annoying
1734mamleaks, such as leaking on C<map> and C<grep> but it is usually not as
1735pronounced).
1736
271 1737
272=head1 SEE ALSO 1738=head1 SEE ALSO
273 1739
274Event modules: L<Coro::Event>, L<Coro>, L<Event>, L<Glib::Event>, L<Glib>. 1740Utility functions: L<AnyEvent::Util>.
275 1741
276Implementations: L<AnyEvent::Impl::Coro>, L<AnyEvent::Impl::Event>, L<AnyEvent::Impl::Glib>, L<AnyEvent::Impl::Tk>. 1742Event modules: L<EV>, L<EV::Glib>, L<Glib::EV>, L<Event>, L<Glib::Event>,
1743L<Glib>, L<Tk>, L<Event::Lib>, L<Qt>, L<POE>.
277 1744
278Nontrivial usage example: L<Net::FCP>. 1745Implementations: L<AnyEvent::Impl::EV>, L<AnyEvent::Impl::Event>,
1746L<AnyEvent::Impl::Glib>, L<AnyEvent::Impl::Tk>, L<AnyEvent::Impl::Perl>,
1747L<AnyEvent::Impl::EventLib>, L<AnyEvent::Impl::Qt>,
1748L<AnyEvent::Impl::POE>.
279 1749
280=head1 1750Non-blocking file handles, sockets, TCP clients and
1751servers: L<AnyEvent::Handle>, L<AnyEvent::Socket>.
1752
1753Asynchronous DNS: L<AnyEvent::DNS>.
1754
1755Coroutine support: L<Coro>, L<Coro::AnyEvent>, L<Coro::EV>, L<Coro::Event>,
1756
1757Nontrivial usage examples: L<Net::FCP>, L<Net::XMPP2>, L<AnyEvent::DNS>.
1758
1759
1760=head1 AUTHOR
1761
1762 Marc Lehmann <schmorp@schmorp.de>
1763 http://home.schmorp.de/
281 1764
282=cut 1765=cut
283 1766
2841 17671
285 1768

Diff Legend

Removed lines
+ Added lines
< Changed lines
> Changed lines