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1=head1 NAME 1=head1 NAME
2 2
3AnyEvent - provide framework for multiple event loops 3AnyEvent - the DBI of event loop programming
4 4
5Event, Coro, Glib, Tk, Perl - various supported event loops 5EV, Event, Glib, Tk, Perl, Event::Lib, Irssi, rxvt-unicode, IO::Async, Qt,
6FLTK and POE are various supported event loops/environments.
6 7
7=head1 SYNOPSIS 8=head1 SYNOPSIS
8 9
9 use AnyEvent; 10 use AnyEvent;
10 11
12 # if you prefer function calls, look at the AE manpage for
13 # an alternative API.
14
15 # file handle or descriptor readable
11 my $w = AnyEvent->io (fh => $fh, poll => "r|w", cb => sub { 16 my $w = AnyEvent->io (fh => $fh, poll => "r", cb => sub { ... });
17
18 # one-shot or repeating timers
19 my $w = AnyEvent->timer (after => $seconds, cb => sub { ... });
20 my $w = AnyEvent->timer (after => $seconds, interval => $seconds, cb => ...);
21
22 print AnyEvent->now; # prints current event loop time
23 print AnyEvent->time; # think Time::HiRes::time or simply CORE::time.
24
25 # POSIX signal
26 my $w = AnyEvent->signal (signal => "TERM", cb => sub { ... });
27
28 # child process exit
29 my $w = AnyEvent->child (pid => $pid, cb => sub {
30 my ($pid, $status) = @_;
12 ... 31 ...
13 }); 32 });
14 33
15 my $w = AnyEvent->timer (after => $seconds, cb => sub { 34 # called when event loop idle (if applicable)
16 ... 35 my $w = AnyEvent->idle (cb => sub { ... });
17 });
18 36
19 my $w = AnyEvent->condvar; # stores wether a condition was flagged 37 my $w = AnyEvent->condvar; # stores whether a condition was flagged
38 $w->send; # wake up current and all future recv's
20 $w->wait; # enters "main loop" till $condvar gets ->broadcast 39 $w->recv; # enters "main loop" till $condvar gets ->send
21 $w->broadcast; # wake up current and all future wait's 40 # use a condvar in callback mode:
41 $w->cb (sub { $_[0]->recv });
42
43=head1 INTRODUCTION/TUTORIAL
44
45This manpage is mainly a reference manual. If you are interested
46in a tutorial or some gentle introduction, have a look at the
47L<AnyEvent::Intro> manpage.
48
49=head1 SUPPORT
50
51An FAQ document is available as L<AnyEvent::FAQ>.
52
53There also is a mailinglist for discussing all things AnyEvent, and an IRC
54channel, too.
55
56See the AnyEvent project page at the B<Schmorpforge Ta-Sa Software
57Repository>, at L<http://anyevent.schmorp.de>, for more info.
22 58
23=head1 WHY YOU SHOULD USE THIS MODULE (OR NOT) 59=head1 WHY YOU SHOULD USE THIS MODULE (OR NOT)
24 60
25Glib, POE, IO::Async, Event... CPAN offers event models by the dozen 61Glib, POE, IO::Async, Event... CPAN offers event models by the dozen
26nowadays. So what is different about AnyEvent? 62nowadays. So what is different about AnyEvent?
27 63
28Executive Summary: AnyEvent is I<compatible>, AnyEvent is I<free of 64Executive Summary: AnyEvent is I<compatible>, AnyEvent is I<free of
29policy> and AnyEvent is I<small and efficient>. 65policy> and AnyEvent is I<small and efficient>.
30 66
31First and foremost, I<AnyEvent is not an event model> itself, it only 67First and foremost, I<AnyEvent is not an event model> itself, it only
32interfaces to whatever event model the main program happens to use in a 68interfaces to whatever event model the main program happens to use, in a
33pragmatic way. For event models and certain classes of immortals alike, 69pragmatic way. For event models and certain classes of immortals alike,
34the statement "there can only be one" is a bitter reality, and AnyEvent 70the statement "there can only be one" is a bitter reality: In general,
35helps hiding the differences. 71only one event loop can be active at the same time in a process. AnyEvent
72cannot change this, but it can hide the differences between those event
73loops.
36 74
37The goal of AnyEvent is to offer module authors the ability to do event 75The goal of AnyEvent is to offer module authors the ability to do event
38programming (waiting for I/O or timer events) without subscribing to a 76programming (waiting for I/O or timer events) without subscribing to a
39religion, a way of living, and most importantly: without forcing your 77religion, a way of living, and most importantly: without forcing your
40module users into the same thing by forcing them to use the same event 78module users into the same thing by forcing them to use the same event
41model you use. 79model you use.
42 80
43For modules like POE or IO::Async (which is actually doing all I/O 81For modules like POE or IO::Async (which is a total misnomer as it is
44I<synchronously>...), using them in your module is like joining a 82actually doing all I/O I<synchronously>...), using them in your module is
45cult: After you joined, you are dependent on them and you cannot use 83like joining a cult: After you join, you are dependent on them and you
46anything else, as it is simply incompatible to everything that isn't 84cannot use anything else, as they are simply incompatible to everything
47itself. 85that isn't them. What's worse, all the potential users of your
86module are I<also> forced to use the same event loop you use.
48 87
49AnyEvent + POE works fine. AnyEvent + Glib works fine. AnyEvent + Tk 88AnyEvent is different: AnyEvent + POE works fine. AnyEvent + Glib works
50works fine etc. etc. but none of these work together with the rest: POE 89fine. AnyEvent + Tk works fine etc. etc. but none of these work together
51+ IO::Async? no go. Tk + Event? no go. If your module uses one of 90with the rest: POE + EV? No go. Tk + Event? No go. Again: if your module
52those, every user of your module has to use it, too. If your module 91uses one of those, every user of your module has to use it, too. But if
53uses AnyEvent, it works transparently with all event models it supports 92your module uses AnyEvent, it works transparently with all event models it
54(including stuff like POE and IO::Async). 93supports (including stuff like IO::Async, as long as those use one of the
94supported event loops. It is easy to add new event loops to AnyEvent, too,
95so it is future-proof).
55 96
56In addition of being free of having to use I<the one and only true event 97In addition to being free of having to use I<the one and only true event
57model>, AnyEvent also is free of bloat and policy: with POE or similar 98model>, AnyEvent also is free of bloat and policy: with POE or similar
58modules, you get an enourmous amount of code and strict rules you have 99modules, you get an enormous amount of code and strict rules you have to
59to follow. AnyEvent, on the other hand, is lean and to the point by only 100follow. AnyEvent, on the other hand, is lean and to the point, by only
60offering the functionality that is useful, in as thin as a wrapper as 101offering the functionality that is necessary, in as thin as a wrapper as
61technically possible. 102technically possible.
62 103
104Of course, AnyEvent comes with a big (and fully optional!) toolbox
105of useful functionality, such as an asynchronous DNS resolver, 100%
106non-blocking connects (even with TLS/SSL, IPv6 and on broken platforms
107such as Windows) and lots of real-world knowledge and workarounds for
108platform bugs and differences.
109
63Of course, if you want lots of policy (this can arguably be somewhat 110Now, if you I<do want> lots of policy (this can arguably be somewhat
64useful) and you want to force your users to use the one and only event 111useful) and you want to force your users to use the one and only event
65model, you should I<not> use this module. 112model, you should I<not> use this module.
66 113
67
68=head1 DESCRIPTION 114=head1 DESCRIPTION
69 115
70L<AnyEvent> provides an identical interface to multiple event loops. This 116L<AnyEvent> provides a uniform interface to various event loops. This
71allows module authors to utilise an event loop without forcing module 117allows module authors to use event loop functionality without forcing
72users to use the same event loop (as only a single event loop can coexist 118module users to use a specific event loop implementation (since more
73peacefully at any one time). 119than one event loop cannot coexist peacefully).
74 120
75The interface itself is vaguely similar but not identical to the Event 121The interface itself is vaguely similar, but not identical to the L<Event>
76module. 122module.
77 123
78On the first call of any method, the module tries to detect the currently 124During the first call of any watcher-creation method, the module tries
79loaded event loop by probing wether any of the following modules is 125to detect the currently loaded event loop by probing whether one of the
80loaded: L<Coro::Event>, L<Event>, L<Glib>, L<Tk>. The first one found is 126following modules is already loaded: L<EV>, L<AnyEvent::Loop>,
81used. If none is found, the module tries to load these modules in the 127L<Event>, L<Glib>, L<Tk>, L<Event::Lib>, L<Qt>, L<POE>. The first one
82order given. The first one that could be successfully loaded will be 128found is used. If none are detected, the module tries to load the first
83used. If still none could be found, AnyEvent will fall back to a pure-perl 129four modules in the order given; but note that if L<EV> is not
84event loop, which is also not very efficient. 130available, the pure-perl L<AnyEvent::Loop> should always work, so
131the other two are not normally tried.
85 132
86Because AnyEvent first checks for modules that are already loaded, loading 133Because AnyEvent first checks for modules that are already loaded, loading
87an Event model explicitly before first using AnyEvent will likely make 134an event model explicitly before first using AnyEvent will likely make
88that model the default. For example: 135that model the default. For example:
89 136
90 use Tk; 137 use Tk;
91 use AnyEvent; 138 use AnyEvent;
92 139
93 # .. AnyEvent will likely default to Tk 140 # .. AnyEvent will likely default to Tk
94 141
142The I<likely> means that, if any module loads another event model and
143starts using it, all bets are off - this case should be very rare though,
144as very few modules hardcode event loops without announcing this very
145loudly.
146
95The pure-perl implementation of AnyEvent is called 147The pure-perl implementation of AnyEvent is called C<AnyEvent::Loop>. Like
96C<AnyEvent::Impl::Perl>. Like other event modules you can load it 148other event modules you can load it explicitly and enjoy the high
97explicitly. 149availability of that event loop :)
98 150
99=head1 WATCHERS 151=head1 WATCHERS
100 152
101AnyEvent has the central concept of a I<watcher>, which is an object that 153AnyEvent has the central concept of a I<watcher>, which is an object that
102stores relevant data for each kind of event you are waiting for, such as 154stores relevant data for each kind of event you are waiting for, such as
103the callback to call, the filehandle to watch, etc. 155the callback to call, the file handle to watch, etc.
104 156
105These watchers are normal Perl objects with normal Perl lifetime. After 157These watchers are normal Perl objects with normal Perl lifetime. After
106creating a watcher it will immediately "watch" for events and invoke 158creating a watcher it will immediately "watch" for events and invoke the
159callback when the event occurs (of course, only when the event model
160is in control).
161
162Note that B<callbacks must not permanently change global variables>
163potentially in use by the event loop (such as C<$_> or C<$[>) and that B<<
164callbacks must not C<die> >>. The former is good programming practice in
165Perl and the latter stems from the fact that exception handling differs
166widely between event loops.
167
107the callback. To disable the watcher you have to destroy it (e.g. by 168To disable a watcher you have to destroy it (e.g. by setting the
108setting the variable that stores it to C<undef> or otherwise deleting all 169variable you store it in to C<undef> or otherwise deleting all references
109references to it). 170to it).
110 171
111All watchers are created by calling a method on the C<AnyEvent> class. 172All watchers are created by calling a method on the C<AnyEvent> class.
112 173
174Many watchers either are used with "recursion" (repeating timers for
175example), or need to refer to their watcher object in other ways.
176
177One way to achieve that is this pattern:
178
179 my $w; $w = AnyEvent->type (arg => value ..., cb => sub {
180 # you can use $w here, for example to undef it
181 undef $w;
182 });
183
184Note that C<my $w; $w => combination. This is necessary because in Perl,
185my variables are only visible after the statement in which they are
186declared.
187
113=head2 IO WATCHERS 188=head2 I/O WATCHERS
114 189
190 $w = AnyEvent->io (
191 fh => <filehandle_or_fileno>,
192 poll => <"r" or "w">,
193 cb => <callback>,
194 );
195
115You can create I/O watcher by calling the C<< AnyEvent->io >> method with 196You can create an I/O watcher by calling the C<< AnyEvent->io >> method
116the following mandatory arguments: 197with the following mandatory key-value pairs as arguments:
117 198
118C<fh> the Perl I<filehandle> (not filedescriptor) to watch for 199C<fh> is the Perl I<file handle> (or a naked file descriptor) to watch
200for events (AnyEvent might or might not keep a reference to this file
201handle). Note that only file handles pointing to things for which
202non-blocking operation makes sense are allowed. This includes sockets,
203most character devices, pipes, fifos and so on, but not for example files
204or block devices.
205
119events. C<poll> must be a string that is either C<r> or C<w>, that creates 206C<poll> must be a string that is either C<r> or C<w>, which creates a
120a watcher waiting for "r"eadable or "w"ritable events. C<cb> the callback 207watcher waiting for "r"eadable or "w"ritable events, respectively.
121to invoke everytime the filehandle becomes ready.
122 208
123Only one io watcher per C<fh> and C<poll> combination is allowed (i.e. on 209C<cb> is the callback to invoke each time the file handle becomes ready.
124a socket you can have one r + one w, not any more (limitation comes from
125Tk - if you are sure you are not using Tk this limitation is gone).
126 210
127Filehandles will be kept alive, so as long as the watcher exists, the 211Although the callback might get passed parameters, their value and
128filehandle exists, too. 212presence is undefined and you cannot rely on them. Portable AnyEvent
213callbacks cannot use arguments passed to I/O watcher callbacks.
129 214
130Example: 215The I/O watcher might use the underlying file descriptor or a copy of it.
216You must not close a file handle as long as any watcher is active on the
217underlying file descriptor.
131 218
219Some event loops issue spurious readiness notifications, so you should
220always use non-blocking calls when reading/writing from/to your file
221handles.
222
132 # wait for readability of STDIN, then read a line and disable the watcher 223Example: wait for readability of STDIN, then read a line and disable the
224watcher.
225
133 my $w; $w = AnyEvent->io (fh => \*STDIN, poll => 'r', cb => sub { 226 my $w; $w = AnyEvent->io (fh => \*STDIN, poll => 'r', cb => sub {
134 chomp (my $input = <STDIN>); 227 chomp (my $input = <STDIN>);
135 warn "read: $input\n"; 228 warn "read: $input\n";
136 undef $w; 229 undef $w;
137 }); 230 });
138 231
139=head2 TIME WATCHERS 232=head2 TIME WATCHERS
140 233
234 $w = AnyEvent->timer (after => <seconds>, cb => <callback>);
235
236 $w = AnyEvent->timer (
237 after => <fractional_seconds>,
238 interval => <fractional_seconds>,
239 cb => <callback>,
240 );
241
141You can create a time watcher by calling the C<< AnyEvent->timer >> 242You can create a time watcher by calling the C<< AnyEvent->timer >>
142method with the following mandatory arguments: 243method with the following mandatory arguments:
143 244
144C<after> after how many seconds (fractions are supported) should the timer 245C<after> specifies after how many seconds (fractional values are
145activate. C<cb> the callback to invoke. 246supported) the callback should be invoked. C<cb> is the callback to invoke
247in that case.
146 248
147The timer callback will be invoked at most once: if you want a repeating 249Although the callback might get passed parameters, their value and
148timer you have to create a new watcher (this is a limitation by both Tk 250presence is undefined and you cannot rely on them. Portable AnyEvent
149and Glib). 251callbacks cannot use arguments passed to time watcher callbacks.
150 252
151Example: 253The callback will normally be invoked only once. If you specify another
254parameter, C<interval>, as a strictly positive number (> 0), then the
255callback will be invoked regularly at that interval (in fractional
256seconds) after the first invocation. If C<interval> is specified with a
257false value, then it is treated as if it were not specified at all.
152 258
259The callback will be rescheduled before invoking the callback, but no
260attempt is made to avoid timer drift in most backends, so the interval is
261only approximate.
262
153 # fire an event after 7.7 seconds 263Example: fire an event after 7.7 seconds.
264
154 my $w = AnyEvent->timer (after => 7.7, cb => sub { 265 my $w = AnyEvent->timer (after => 7.7, cb => sub {
155 warn "timeout\n"; 266 warn "timeout\n";
156 }); 267 });
157 268
158 # to cancel the timer: 269 # to cancel the timer:
159 undef $w; 270 undef $w;
160 271
161=head2 CONDITION WATCHERS 272Example 2: fire an event after 0.5 seconds, then roughly every second.
162 273
163Condition watchers can be created by calling the C<< AnyEvent->condvar >> 274 my $w = AnyEvent->timer (after => 0.5, interval => 1, cb => sub {
164method without any arguments. 275 warn "timeout\n";
276 };
165 277
166A condition watcher watches for a condition - precisely that the C<< 278=head3 TIMING ISSUES
167->broadcast >> method has been called.
168 279
169Note that condition watchers recurse into the event loop - if you have 280There are two ways to handle timers: based on real time (relative, "fire
170two watchers that call C<< ->wait >> in a round-robbin fashion, you 281in 10 seconds") and based on wallclock time (absolute, "fire at 12
171lose. Therefore, condition watchers are good to export to your caller, but 282o'clock").
172you should avoid making a blocking wait, at least in callbacks, as this
173usually asks for trouble.
174 283
175The watcher has only two methods: 284While most event loops expect timers to specified in a relative way, they
285use absolute time internally. This makes a difference when your clock
286"jumps", for example, when ntp decides to set your clock backwards from
287the wrong date of 2014-01-01 to 2008-01-01, a watcher that is supposed to
288fire "after a second" might actually take six years to finally fire.
289
290AnyEvent cannot compensate for this. The only event loop that is conscious
291of these issues is L<EV>, which offers both relative (ev_timer, based
292on true relative time) and absolute (ev_periodic, based on wallclock time)
293timers.
294
295AnyEvent always prefers relative timers, if available, matching the
296AnyEvent API.
297
298AnyEvent has two additional methods that return the "current time":
176 299
177=over 4 300=over 4
178 301
302=item AnyEvent->time
303
304This returns the "current wallclock time" as a fractional number of
305seconds since the Epoch (the same thing as C<time> or C<Time::HiRes::time>
306return, and the result is guaranteed to be compatible with those).
307
308It progresses independently of any event loop processing, i.e. each call
309will check the system clock, which usually gets updated frequently.
310
311=item AnyEvent->now
312
313This also returns the "current wallclock time", but unlike C<time>, above,
314this value might change only once per event loop iteration, depending on
315the event loop (most return the same time as C<time>, above). This is the
316time that AnyEvent's timers get scheduled against.
317
318I<In almost all cases (in all cases if you don't care), this is the
319function to call when you want to know the current time.>
320
321This function is also often faster then C<< AnyEvent->time >>, and
322thus the preferred method if you want some timestamp (for example,
323L<AnyEvent::Handle> uses this to update its activity timeouts).
324
325The rest of this section is only of relevance if you try to be very exact
326with your timing; you can skip it without a bad conscience.
327
328For a practical example of when these times differ, consider L<Event::Lib>
329and L<EV> and the following set-up:
330
331The event loop is running and has just invoked one of your callbacks at
332time=500 (assume no other callbacks delay processing). In your callback,
333you wait a second by executing C<sleep 1> (blocking the process for a
334second) and then (at time=501) you create a relative timer that fires
335after three seconds.
336
337With L<Event::Lib>, C<< AnyEvent->time >> and C<< AnyEvent->now >> will
338both return C<501>, because that is the current time, and the timer will
339be scheduled to fire at time=504 (C<501> + C<3>).
340
341With L<EV>, C<< AnyEvent->time >> returns C<501> (as that is the current
342time), but C<< AnyEvent->now >> returns C<500>, as that is the time the
343last event processing phase started. With L<EV>, your timer gets scheduled
344to run at time=503 (C<500> + C<3>).
345
346In one sense, L<Event::Lib> is more exact, as it uses the current time
347regardless of any delays introduced by event processing. However, most
348callbacks do not expect large delays in processing, so this causes a
349higher drift (and a lot more system calls to get the current time).
350
351In another sense, L<EV> is more exact, as your timer will be scheduled at
352the same time, regardless of how long event processing actually took.
353
354In either case, if you care (and in most cases, you don't), then you
355can get whatever behaviour you want with any event loop, by taking the
356difference between C<< AnyEvent->time >> and C<< AnyEvent->now >> into
357account.
358
359=item AnyEvent->now_update
360
361Some event loops (such as L<EV> or L<AnyEvent::Loop>) cache the current
362time for each loop iteration (see the discussion of L<< AnyEvent->now >>,
363above).
364
365When a callback runs for a long time (or when the process sleeps), then
366this "current" time will differ substantially from the real time, which
367might affect timers and time-outs.
368
369When this is the case, you can call this method, which will update the
370event loop's idea of "current time".
371
372A typical example would be a script in a web server (e.g. C<mod_perl>) -
373when mod_perl executes the script, then the event loop will have the wrong
374idea about the "current time" (being potentially far in the past, when the
375script ran the last time). In that case you should arrange a call to C<<
376AnyEvent->now_update >> each time the web server process wakes up again
377(e.g. at the start of your script, or in a handler).
378
379Note that updating the time I<might> cause some events to be handled.
380
381=back
382
383=head2 SIGNAL WATCHERS
384
385 $w = AnyEvent->signal (signal => <uppercase_signal_name>, cb => <callback>);
386
387You can watch for signals using a signal watcher, C<signal> is the signal
388I<name> in uppercase and without any C<SIG> prefix, C<cb> is the Perl
389callback to be invoked whenever a signal occurs.
390
391Although the callback might get passed parameters, their value and
392presence is undefined and you cannot rely on them. Portable AnyEvent
393callbacks cannot use arguments passed to signal watcher callbacks.
394
395Multiple signal occurrences can be clumped together into one callback
396invocation, and callback invocation will be synchronous. Synchronous means
397that it might take a while until the signal gets handled by the process,
398but it is guaranteed not to interrupt any other callbacks.
399
400The main advantage of using these watchers is that you can share a signal
401between multiple watchers, and AnyEvent will ensure that signals will not
402interrupt your program at bad times.
403
404This watcher might use C<%SIG> (depending on the event loop used),
405so programs overwriting those signals directly will likely not work
406correctly.
407
408Example: exit on SIGINT
409
410 my $w = AnyEvent->signal (signal => "INT", cb => sub { exit 1 });
411
412=head3 Restart Behaviour
413
414While restart behaviour is up to the event loop implementation, most will
415not restart syscalls (that includes L<Async::Interrupt> and AnyEvent's
416pure perl implementation).
417
418=head3 Safe/Unsafe Signals
419
420Perl signals can be either "safe" (synchronous to opcode handling)
421or "unsafe" (asynchronous) - the former might delay signal delivery
422indefinitely, the latter might corrupt your memory.
423
424AnyEvent signal handlers are, in addition, synchronous to the event loop,
425i.e. they will not interrupt your running perl program but will only be
426called as part of the normal event handling (just like timer, I/O etc.
427callbacks, too).
428
429=head3 Signal Races, Delays and Workarounds
430
431Many event loops (e.g. Glib, Tk, Qt, IO::Async) do not support
432attaching callbacks to signals in a generic way, which is a pity,
433as you cannot do race-free signal handling in perl, requiring
434C libraries for this. AnyEvent will try to do its best, which
435means in some cases, signals will be delayed. The maximum time
436a signal might be delayed is 10 seconds by default, but can
437be overriden via C<$ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_MAX_SIGNAL_LATENCY}> or
438C<$AnyEvent::MAX_SIGNAL_LATENCY> - see the L<ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES>
439section for details.
440
441All these problems can be avoided by installing the optional
442L<Async::Interrupt> module, which works with most event loops. It will not
443work with inherently broken event loops such as L<Event> or L<Event::Lib>
444(and not with L<POE> currently). For those, you just have to suffer the
445delays.
446
447=head2 CHILD PROCESS WATCHERS
448
449 $w = AnyEvent->child (pid => <process id>, cb => <callback>);
450
451You can also watch for a child process exit and catch its exit status.
452
453The child process is specified by the C<pid> argument (on some backends,
454using C<0> watches for any child process exit, on others this will
455croak). The watcher will be triggered only when the child process has
456finished and an exit status is available, not on any trace events
457(stopped/continued).
458
459The callback will be called with the pid and exit status (as returned by
460waitpid), so unlike other watcher types, you I<can> rely on child watcher
461callback arguments.
462
463This watcher type works by installing a signal handler for C<SIGCHLD>,
464and since it cannot be shared, nothing else should use SIGCHLD or reap
465random child processes (waiting for specific child processes, e.g. inside
466C<system>, is just fine).
467
468There is a slight catch to child watchers, however: you usually start them
469I<after> the child process was created, and this means the process could
470have exited already (and no SIGCHLD will be sent anymore).
471
472Not all event models handle this correctly (neither POE nor IO::Async do,
473see their AnyEvent::Impl manpages for details), but even for event models
474that I<do> handle this correctly, they usually need to be loaded before
475the process exits (i.e. before you fork in the first place). AnyEvent's
476pure perl event loop handles all cases correctly regardless of when you
477start the watcher.
478
479This means you cannot create a child watcher as the very first
480thing in an AnyEvent program, you I<have> to create at least one
481watcher before you C<fork> the child (alternatively, you can call
482C<AnyEvent::detect>).
483
484As most event loops do not support waiting for child events, they will be
485emulated by AnyEvent in most cases, in which case the latency and race
486problems mentioned in the description of signal watchers apply.
487
488Example: fork a process and wait for it
489
490 my $done = AnyEvent->condvar;
491
492 my $pid = fork or exit 5;
493
494 my $w = AnyEvent->child (
495 pid => $pid,
496 cb => sub {
497 my ($pid, $status) = @_;
498 warn "pid $pid exited with status $status";
499 $done->send;
500 },
501 );
502
503 # do something else, then wait for process exit
504 $done->recv;
505
506=head2 IDLE WATCHERS
507
508 $w = AnyEvent->idle (cb => <callback>);
509
510This will repeatedly invoke the callback after the process becomes idle,
511until either the watcher is destroyed or new events have been detected.
512
513Idle watchers are useful when there is a need to do something, but it
514is not so important (or wise) to do it instantly. The callback will be
515invoked only when there is "nothing better to do", which is usually
516defined as "all outstanding events have been handled and no new events
517have been detected". That means that idle watchers ideally get invoked
518when the event loop has just polled for new events but none have been
519detected. Instead of blocking to wait for more events, the idle watchers
520will be invoked.
521
522Unfortunately, most event loops do not really support idle watchers (only
523EV, Event and Glib do it in a usable fashion) - for the rest, AnyEvent
524will simply call the callback "from time to time".
525
526Example: read lines from STDIN, but only process them when the
527program is otherwise idle:
528
529 my @lines; # read data
530 my $idle_w;
531 my $io_w = AnyEvent->io (fh => \*STDIN, poll => 'r', cb => sub {
532 push @lines, scalar <STDIN>;
533
534 # start an idle watcher, if not already done
535 $idle_w ||= AnyEvent->idle (cb => sub {
536 # handle only one line, when there are lines left
537 if (my $line = shift @lines) {
538 print "handled when idle: $line";
539 } else {
540 # otherwise disable the idle watcher again
541 undef $idle_w;
542 }
543 });
544 });
545
546=head2 CONDITION VARIABLES
547
548 $cv = AnyEvent->condvar;
549
550 $cv->send (<list>);
551 my @res = $cv->recv;
552
553If you are familiar with some event loops you will know that all of them
554require you to run some blocking "loop", "run" or similar function that
555will actively watch for new events and call your callbacks.
556
557AnyEvent is slightly different: it expects somebody else to run the event
558loop and will only block when necessary (usually when told by the user).
559
560The tool to do that is called a "condition variable", so called because
561they represent a condition that must become true.
562
563Now is probably a good time to look at the examples further below.
564
565Condition variables can be created by calling the C<< AnyEvent->condvar
566>> method, usually without arguments. The only argument pair allowed is
567C<cb>, which specifies a callback to be called when the condition variable
568becomes true, with the condition variable as the first argument (but not
569the results).
570
571After creation, the condition variable is "false" until it becomes "true"
572by calling the C<send> method (or calling the condition variable as if it
573were a callback, read about the caveats in the description for the C<<
574->send >> method).
575
576Since condition variables are the most complex part of the AnyEvent API, here are
577some different mental models of what they are - pick the ones you can connect to:
578
579=over 4
580
581=item * Condition variables are like callbacks - you can call them (and pass them instead
582of callbacks). Unlike callbacks however, you can also wait for them to be called.
583
584=item * Condition variables are signals - one side can emit or send them,
585the other side can wait for them, or install a handler that is called when
586the signal fires.
587
588=item * Condition variables are like "Merge Points" - points in your program
589where you merge multiple independent results/control flows into one.
590
591=item * Condition variables represent a transaction - functions that start
592some kind of transaction can return them, leaving the caller the choice
593between waiting in a blocking fashion, or setting a callback.
594
595=item * Condition variables represent future values, or promises to deliver
596some result, long before the result is available.
597
598=back
599
600Condition variables are very useful to signal that something has finished,
601for example, if you write a module that does asynchronous http requests,
602then a condition variable would be the ideal candidate to signal the
603availability of results. The user can either act when the callback is
604called or can synchronously C<< ->recv >> for the results.
605
606You can also use them to simulate traditional event loops - for example,
607you can block your main program until an event occurs - for example, you
608could C<< ->recv >> in your main program until the user clicks the Quit
609button of your app, which would C<< ->send >> the "quit" event.
610
611Note that condition variables recurse into the event loop - if you have
612two pieces of code that call C<< ->recv >> in a round-robin fashion, you
613lose. Therefore, condition variables are good to export to your caller, but
614you should avoid making a blocking wait yourself, at least in callbacks,
615as this asks for trouble.
616
617Condition variables are represented by hash refs in perl, and the keys
618used by AnyEvent itself are all named C<_ae_XXX> to make subclassing
619easy (it is often useful to build your own transaction class on top of
620AnyEvent). To subclass, use C<AnyEvent::CondVar> as base class and call
621its C<new> method in your own C<new> method.
622
623There are two "sides" to a condition variable - the "producer side" which
624eventually calls C<< -> send >>, and the "consumer side", which waits
625for the send to occur.
626
627Example: wait for a timer.
628
629 # condition: "wait till the timer is fired"
630 my $timer_fired = AnyEvent->condvar;
631
632 # create the timer - we could wait for, say
633 # a handle becomign ready, or even an
634 # AnyEvent::HTTP request to finish, but
635 # in this case, we simply use a timer:
636 my $w = AnyEvent->timer (
637 after => 1,
638 cb => sub { $timer_fired->send },
639 );
640
641 # this "blocks" (while handling events) till the callback
642 # calls ->send
643 $timer_fired->recv;
644
645Example: wait for a timer, but take advantage of the fact that condition
646variables are also callable directly.
647
648 my $done = AnyEvent->condvar;
649 my $delay = AnyEvent->timer (after => 5, cb => $done);
650 $done->recv;
651
652Example: Imagine an API that returns a condvar and doesn't support
653callbacks. This is how you make a synchronous call, for example from
654the main program:
655
656 use AnyEvent::CouchDB;
657
658 ...
659
660 my @info = $couchdb->info->recv;
661
662And this is how you would just set a callback to be called whenever the
663results are available:
664
665 $couchdb->info->cb (sub {
666 my @info = $_[0]->recv;
667 });
668
669=head3 METHODS FOR PRODUCERS
670
671These methods should only be used by the producing side, i.e. the
672code/module that eventually sends the signal. Note that it is also
673the producer side which creates the condvar in most cases, but it isn't
674uncommon for the consumer to create it as well.
675
676=over 4
677
678=item $cv->send (...)
679
680Flag the condition as ready - a running C<< ->recv >> and all further
681calls to C<recv> will (eventually) return after this method has been
682called. If nobody is waiting the send will be remembered.
683
684If a callback has been set on the condition variable, it is called
685immediately from within send.
686
687Any arguments passed to the C<send> call will be returned by all
688future C<< ->recv >> calls.
689
690Condition variables are overloaded so one can call them directly (as if
691they were a code reference). Calling them directly is the same as calling
692C<send>.
693
694=item $cv->croak ($error)
695
696Similar to send, but causes all calls to C<< ->recv >> to invoke
697C<Carp::croak> with the given error message/object/scalar.
698
699This can be used to signal any errors to the condition variable
700user/consumer. Doing it this way instead of calling C<croak> directly
701delays the error detection, but has the overwhelming advantage that it
702diagnoses the error at the place where the result is expected, and not
703deep in some event callback with no connection to the actual code causing
704the problem.
705
706=item $cv->begin ([group callback])
707
179=item $cv->wait 708=item $cv->end
180 709
181Wait (blocking if necessary) until the C<< ->broadcast >> method has been 710These two methods can be used to combine many transactions/events into
182called on c<$cv>, while servicing other watchers normally. 711one. For example, a function that pings many hosts in parallel might want
712to use a condition variable for the whole process.
183 713
714Every call to C<< ->begin >> will increment a counter, and every call to
715C<< ->end >> will decrement it. If the counter reaches C<0> in C<< ->end
716>>, the (last) callback passed to C<begin> will be executed, passing the
717condvar as first argument. That callback is I<supposed> to call C<< ->send
718>>, but that is not required. If no group callback was set, C<send> will
719be called without any arguments.
720
721You can think of C<< $cv->send >> giving you an OR condition (one call
722sends), while C<< $cv->begin >> and C<< $cv->end >> giving you an AND
723condition (all C<begin> calls must be C<end>'ed before the condvar sends).
724
725Let's start with a simple example: you have two I/O watchers (for example,
726STDOUT and STDERR for a program), and you want to wait for both streams to
727close before activating a condvar:
728
729 my $cv = AnyEvent->condvar;
730
731 $cv->begin; # first watcher
732 my $w1 = AnyEvent->io (fh => $fh1, cb => sub {
733 defined sysread $fh1, my $buf, 4096
734 or $cv->end;
735 });
736
737 $cv->begin; # second watcher
738 my $w2 = AnyEvent->io (fh => $fh2, cb => sub {
739 defined sysread $fh2, my $buf, 4096
740 or $cv->end;
741 });
742
743 $cv->recv;
744
745This works because for every event source (EOF on file handle), there is
746one call to C<begin>, so the condvar waits for all calls to C<end> before
747sending.
748
749The ping example mentioned above is slightly more complicated, as the
750there are results to be passwd back, and the number of tasks that are
751begun can potentially be zero:
752
753 my $cv = AnyEvent->condvar;
754
755 my %result;
756 $cv->begin (sub { shift->send (\%result) });
757
758 for my $host (@list_of_hosts) {
759 $cv->begin;
760 ping_host_then_call_callback $host, sub {
761 $result{$host} = ...;
762 $cv->end;
763 };
764 }
765
766 $cv->end;
767
768 ...
769
770 my $results = $cv->recv;
771
772This code fragment supposedly pings a number of hosts and calls
773C<send> after results for all then have have been gathered - in any
774order. To achieve this, the code issues a call to C<begin> when it starts
775each ping request and calls C<end> when it has received some result for
776it. Since C<begin> and C<end> only maintain a counter, the order in which
777results arrive is not relevant.
778
779There is an additional bracketing call to C<begin> and C<end> outside the
780loop, which serves two important purposes: first, it sets the callback
781to be called once the counter reaches C<0>, and second, it ensures that
782C<send> is called even when C<no> hosts are being pinged (the loop
783doesn't execute once).
784
785This is the general pattern when you "fan out" into multiple (but
786potentially zero) subrequests: use an outer C<begin>/C<end> pair to set
787the callback and ensure C<end> is called at least once, and then, for each
788subrequest you start, call C<begin> and for each subrequest you finish,
789call C<end>.
790
791=back
792
793=head3 METHODS FOR CONSUMERS
794
795These methods should only be used by the consuming side, i.e. the
796code awaits the condition.
797
798=over 4
799
800=item $cv->recv
801
802Wait (blocking if necessary) until the C<< ->send >> or C<< ->croak
803>> methods have been called on C<$cv>, while servicing other watchers
804normally.
805
184You can only wait once on a condition - additional calls will return 806You can only wait once on a condition - additional calls are valid but
185immediately. 807will return immediately.
808
809If an error condition has been set by calling C<< ->croak >>, then this
810function will call C<croak>.
811
812In list context, all parameters passed to C<send> will be returned,
813in scalar context only the first one will be returned.
814
815Note that doing a blocking wait in a callback is not supported by any
816event loop, that is, recursive invocation of a blocking C<< ->recv
817>> is not allowed, and the C<recv> call will C<croak> if such a
818condition is detected. This condition can be slightly loosened by using
819L<Coro::AnyEvent>, which allows you to do a blocking C<< ->recv >> from
820any thread that doesn't run the event loop itself.
186 821
187Not all event models support a blocking wait - some die in that case 822Not all event models support a blocking wait - some die in that case
188(programs might want to do that so they stay interactive), so I<if you 823(programs might want to do that to stay interactive), so I<if you are
189are using this from a module, never require a blocking wait>, but let the 824using this from a module, never require a blocking wait>. Instead, let the
190caller decide wether the call will block or not (for example, by coupling 825caller decide whether the call will block or not (for example, by coupling
191condition variables with some kind of request results and supporting 826condition variables with some kind of request results and supporting
192callbacks so the caller knows that getting the result will not block, 827callbacks so the caller knows that getting the result will not block,
193while still suppporting blocking waits if the caller so desires). 828while still supporting blocking waits if the caller so desires).
194 829
195Another reason I<never> to C<< ->wait >> in a module is that you cannot 830You can ensure that C<< ->recv >> never blocks by setting a callback and
196sensibly have two C<< ->wait >>'s in parallel, as that would require 831only calling C<< ->recv >> from within that callback (or at a later
197multiple interpreters or coroutines/threads, none of which C<AnyEvent> 832time). This will work even when the event loop does not support blocking
198can supply (the coroutine-aware backends C<Coro::EV> and C<Coro::Event> 833waits otherwise.
199explicitly support concurrent C<< ->wait >>'s from different coroutines,
200however).
201 834
202=item $cv->broadcast 835=item $bool = $cv->ready
203 836
204Flag the condition as ready - a running C<< ->wait >> and all further 837Returns true when the condition is "true", i.e. whether C<send> or
205calls to C<wait> will return after this method has been called. If nobody 838C<croak> have been called.
206is waiting the broadcast will be remembered..
207 839
208Example: 840=item $cb = $cv->cb ($cb->($cv))
209 841
210 # wait till the result is ready 842This is a mutator function that returns the callback set and optionally
211 my $result_ready = AnyEvent->condvar; 843replaces it before doing so.
212 844
213 # do something such as adding a timer 845The callback will be called when the condition becomes "true", i.e. when
214 # or socket watcher the calls $result_ready->broadcast 846C<send> or C<croak> are called, with the only argument being the
215 # when the "result" is ready. 847condition variable itself. If the condition is already true, the
216 848callback is called immediately when it is set. Calling C<recv> inside
217 $result_ready->wait; 849the callback or at any later time is guaranteed not to block.
218 850
219=back 851=back
220 852
221=head2 SIGNAL WATCHERS 853=head1 SUPPORTED EVENT LOOPS/BACKENDS
222 854
223You can listen for signals using a signal watcher, C<signal> is the signal 855The available backend classes are (every class has its own manpage):
224I<name> without any C<SIG> prefix. Multiple signals events can be clumped
225together into one callback invocation, and callback invocation might or
226might not be asynchronous.
227
228These watchers might use C<%SIG>, so programs overwriting those signals
229directly will likely not work correctly.
230
231Example: exit on SIGINT
232
233 my $w = AnyEvent->signal (signal => "INT", cb => sub { exit 1 });
234
235=head2 CHILD PROCESS WATCHERS
236
237You can also listen for the status of a child process specified by the
238C<pid> argument (or any child if the pid argument is 0). The watcher will
239trigger as often as status change for the child are received. This works
240by installing a signal handler for C<SIGCHLD>. The callback will be called with
241the pid and exit status (as returned by waitpid).
242
243Example: wait for pid 1333
244
245 my $w = AnyEvent->child (pid => 1333, cb => sub { warn "exit status $?" });
246
247=head1 GLOBALS
248 856
249=over 4 857=over 4
250 858
859=item Backends that are autoprobed when no other event loop can be found.
860
861EV is the preferred backend when no other event loop seems to be in
862use. If EV is not installed, then AnyEvent will fall back to its own
863pure-perl implementation, which is available everywhere as it comes with
864AnyEvent itself.
865
866 AnyEvent::Impl::EV based on EV (interface to libev, best choice).
867 AnyEvent::Impl::Perl pure-perl AnyEvent::Loop, fast and portable.
868
869=item Backends that are transparently being picked up when they are used.
870
871These will be used if they are already loaded when the first watcher
872is created, in which case it is assumed that the application is using
873them. This means that AnyEvent will automatically pick the right backend
874when the main program loads an event module before anything starts to
875create watchers. Nothing special needs to be done by the main program.
876
877 AnyEvent::Impl::Event based on Event, very stable, few glitches.
878 AnyEvent::Impl::Glib based on Glib, slow but very stable.
879 AnyEvent::Impl::Tk based on Tk, very broken.
880 AnyEvent::Impl::EventLib based on Event::Lib, leaks memory and worse.
881 AnyEvent::Impl::POE based on POE, very slow, some limitations.
882 AnyEvent::Impl::Irssi used when running within irssi.
883 AnyEvent::Impl::IOAsync based on IO::Async.
884 AnyEvent::Impl::Cocoa based on Cocoa::EventLoop.
885 AnyEvent::Impl::FLTK based on FLTK (fltk 2 binding).
886
887=item Backends with special needs.
888
889Qt requires the Qt::Application to be instantiated first, but will
890otherwise be picked up automatically. As long as the main program
891instantiates the application before any AnyEvent watchers are created,
892everything should just work.
893
894 AnyEvent::Impl::Qt based on Qt.
895
896=item Event loops that are indirectly supported via other backends.
897
898Some event loops can be supported via other modules:
899
900There is no direct support for WxWidgets (L<Wx>) or L<Prima>.
901
902B<WxWidgets> has no support for watching file handles. However, you can
903use WxWidgets through the POE adaptor, as POE has a Wx backend that simply
904polls 20 times per second, which was considered to be too horrible to even
905consider for AnyEvent.
906
907B<Prima> is not supported as nobody seems to be using it, but it has a POE
908backend, so it can be supported through POE.
909
910AnyEvent knows about both L<Prima> and L<Wx>, however, and will try to
911load L<POE> when detecting them, in the hope that POE will pick them up,
912in which case everything will be automatic.
913
914=back
915
916=head1 GLOBAL VARIABLES AND FUNCTIONS
917
918These are not normally required to use AnyEvent, but can be useful to
919write AnyEvent extension modules.
920
921=over 4
922
251=item $AnyEvent::MODEL 923=item $AnyEvent::MODEL
252 924
253Contains C<undef> until the first watcher is being created. Then it 925Contains C<undef> until the first watcher is being created, before the
926backend has been autodetected.
927
254contains the event model that is being used, which is the name of the 928Afterwards it contains the event model that is being used, which is the
255Perl class implementing the model. This class is usually one of the 929name of the Perl class implementing the model. This class is usually one
256C<AnyEvent::Impl:xxx> modules, but can be any other class in the case 930of the C<AnyEvent::Impl::xxx> modules, but can be any other class in the
257AnyEvent has been extended at runtime (e.g. in I<rxvt-unicode>). 931case AnyEvent has been extended at runtime (e.g. in I<rxvt-unicode> it
258 932will be C<urxvt::anyevent>).
259The known classes so far are:
260
261 AnyEvent::Impl::CoroEV based on Coro::EV, best choice.
262 AnyEvent::Impl::EV based on EV (an interface to libev, also best choice).
263 AnyEvent::Impl::CoroEvent based on Coro::Event, second best choice.
264 AnyEvent::Impl::Event based on Event, also second best choice :)
265 AnyEvent::Impl::Glib based on Glib, third-best choice.
266 AnyEvent::Impl::Tk based on Tk, very bad choice.
267 AnyEvent::Impl::Perl pure-perl implementation, inefficient but portable.
268 933
269=item AnyEvent::detect 934=item AnyEvent::detect
270 935
271Returns C<$AnyEvent::MODEL>, forcing autodetection of the event model if 936Returns C<$AnyEvent::MODEL>, forcing autodetection of the event model
272necessary. You should only call this function right before you would have 937if necessary. You should only call this function right before you would
273created an AnyEvent watcher anyway, that is, very late at runtime. 938have created an AnyEvent watcher anyway, that is, as late as possible at
939runtime, and not e.g. during initialisation of your module.
940
941The effect of calling this function is as if a watcher had been created
942(specifically, actions that happen "when the first watcher is created"
943happen when calling detetc as well).
944
945If you need to do some initialisation before AnyEvent watchers are
946created, use C<post_detect>.
947
948=item $guard = AnyEvent::post_detect { BLOCK }
949
950Arranges for the code block to be executed as soon as the event model is
951autodetected (or immediately if that has already happened).
952
953The block will be executed I<after> the actual backend has been detected
954(C<$AnyEvent::MODEL> is set), but I<before> any watchers have been
955created, so it is possible to e.g. patch C<@AnyEvent::ISA> or do
956other initialisations - see the sources of L<AnyEvent::Strict> or
957L<AnyEvent::AIO> to see how this is used.
958
959The most common usage is to create some global watchers, without forcing
960event module detection too early, for example, L<AnyEvent::AIO> creates
961and installs the global L<IO::AIO> watcher in a C<post_detect> block to
962avoid autodetecting the event module at load time.
963
964If called in scalar or list context, then it creates and returns an object
965that automatically removes the callback again when it is destroyed (or
966C<undef> when the hook was immediately executed). See L<AnyEvent::AIO> for
967a case where this is useful.
968
969Example: Create a watcher for the IO::AIO module and store it in
970C<$WATCHER>, but do so only do so after the event loop is initialised.
971
972 our WATCHER;
973
974 my $guard = AnyEvent::post_detect {
975 $WATCHER = AnyEvent->io (fh => IO::AIO::poll_fileno, poll => 'r', cb => \&IO::AIO::poll_cb);
976 };
977
978 # the ||= is important in case post_detect immediately runs the block,
979 # as to not clobber the newly-created watcher. assigning both watcher and
980 # post_detect guard to the same variable has the advantage of users being
981 # able to just C<undef $WATCHER> if the watcher causes them grief.
982
983 $WATCHER ||= $guard;
984
985=item @AnyEvent::post_detect
986
987If there are any code references in this array (you can C<push> to it
988before or after loading AnyEvent), then they will be called directly
989after the event loop has been chosen.
990
991You should check C<$AnyEvent::MODEL> before adding to this array, though:
992if it is defined then the event loop has already been detected, and the
993array will be ignored.
994
995Best use C<AnyEvent::post_detect { BLOCK }> when your application allows
996it, as it takes care of these details.
997
998This variable is mainly useful for modules that can do something useful
999when AnyEvent is used and thus want to know when it is initialised, but do
1000not need to even load it by default. This array provides the means to hook
1001into AnyEvent passively, without loading it.
1002
1003Example: To load Coro::AnyEvent whenever Coro and AnyEvent are used
1004together, you could put this into Coro (this is the actual code used by
1005Coro to accomplish this):
1006
1007 if (defined $AnyEvent::MODEL) {
1008 # AnyEvent already initialised, so load Coro::AnyEvent
1009 require Coro::AnyEvent;
1010 } else {
1011 # AnyEvent not yet initialised, so make sure to load Coro::AnyEvent
1012 # as soon as it is
1013 push @AnyEvent::post_detect, sub { require Coro::AnyEvent };
1014 }
1015
1016=item AnyEvent::postpone { BLOCK }
1017
1018Arranges for the block to be executed as soon as possible, but not before
1019the call itself returns. In practise, the block will be executed just
1020before the event loop polls for new events, or shortly afterwards.
1021
1022This function never returns anything (to make the C<return postpone { ...
1023}> idiom more useful.
1024
1025To understand the usefulness of this function, consider a function that
1026asynchronously does something for you and returns some transaction
1027object or guard to let you cancel the operation. For example,
1028C<AnyEvent::Socket::tcp_connect>:
1029
1030 # start a conenction attempt unless one is active
1031 $self->{connect_guard} ||= AnyEvent::Socket::tcp_connect "www.example.net", 80, sub {
1032 delete $self->{connect_guard};
1033 ...
1034 };
1035
1036Imagine that this function could instantly call the callback, for
1037example, because it detects an obvious error such as a negative port
1038number. Invoking the callback before the function returns causes problems
1039however: the callback will be called and will try to delete the guard
1040object. But since the function hasn't returned yet, there is nothing to
1041delete. When the function eventually returns it will assign the guard
1042object to C<< $self->{connect_guard} >>, where it will likely never be
1043deleted, so the program thinks it is still trying to connect.
1044
1045This is where C<AnyEvent::postpone> should be used. Instead of calling the
1046callback directly on error:
1047
1048 $cb->(undef), return # signal error to callback, BAD!
1049 if $some_error_condition;
1050
1051It should use C<postpone>:
1052
1053 AnyEvent::postpone { $cb->(undef) }, return # signal error to callback, later
1054 if $some_error_condition;
1055
1056=item AnyEvent::log $level, $msg[, @args]
1057
1058Log the given C<$msg> at the given C<$level>.
1059
1060If L<AnyEvent::Log> is not loaded then this function makes a simple test
1061to see whether the message will be logged. If the test succeeds it will
1062load AnyEvent::Log and call C<AnyEvent::Log::log> - consequently, look at
1063the L<AnyEvent::Log> documentation for details.
1064
1065If the test fails it will simply return. Right now this happens when a
1066numerical loglevel is used and it is larger than the level specified via
1067C<$ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_VERBOSE}>.
1068
1069If you want to sprinkle loads of logging calls around your code, consider
1070creating a logger callback with the C<AnyEvent::Log::logger> function,
1071which can reduce typing, codesize and can reduce the logging overhead
1072enourmously.
274 1073
275=back 1074=back
276 1075
277=head1 WHAT TO DO IN A MODULE 1076=head1 WHAT TO DO IN A MODULE
278 1077
279As a module author, you should "use AnyEvent" and call AnyEvent methods 1078As a module author, you should C<use AnyEvent> and call AnyEvent methods
280freely, but you should not load a specific event module or rely on it. 1079freely, but you should not load a specific event module or rely on it.
281 1080
282Be careful when you create watchers in the module body - Anyevent will 1081Be careful when you create watchers in the module body - AnyEvent will
283decide which event module to use as soon as the first method is called, so 1082decide which event module to use as soon as the first method is called, so
284by calling AnyEvent in your module body you force the user of your module 1083by calling AnyEvent in your module body you force the user of your module
285to load the event module first. 1084to load the event module first.
286 1085
1086Never call C<< ->recv >> on a condition variable unless you I<know> that
1087the C<< ->send >> method has been called on it already. This is
1088because it will stall the whole program, and the whole point of using
1089events is to stay interactive.
1090
1091It is fine, however, to call C<< ->recv >> when the user of your module
1092requests it (i.e. if you create a http request object ad have a method
1093called C<results> that returns the results, it may call C<< ->recv >>
1094freely, as the user of your module knows what she is doing. Always).
1095
287=head1 WHAT TO DO IN THE MAIN PROGRAM 1096=head1 WHAT TO DO IN THE MAIN PROGRAM
288 1097
289There will always be a single main program - the only place that should 1098There will always be a single main program - the only place that should
290dictate which event model to use. 1099dictate which event model to use.
291 1100
292If it doesn't care, it can just "use AnyEvent" and use it itself, or not 1101If the program is not event-based, it need not do anything special, even
293do anything special and let AnyEvent decide which implementation to chose. 1102when it depends on a module that uses an AnyEvent. If the program itself
1103uses AnyEvent, but does not care which event loop is used, all it needs
1104to do is C<use AnyEvent>. In either case, AnyEvent will choose the best
1105available loop implementation.
294 1106
295If the main program relies on a specific event model (for example, in Gtk2 1107If the main program relies on a specific event model - for example, in
296programs you have to rely on either Glib or Glib::Event), you should load 1108Gtk2 programs you have to rely on the Glib module - you should load the
297it before loading AnyEvent or any module that uses it, generally, as early 1109event module before loading AnyEvent or any module that uses it: generally
298as possible. The reason is that modules might create watchers when they 1110speaking, you should load it as early as possible. The reason is that
299are loaded, and AnyEvent will decide on the event model to use as soon as 1111modules might create watchers when they are loaded, and AnyEvent will
300it creates watchers, and it might chose the wrong one unless you load the 1112decide on the event model to use as soon as it creates watchers, and it
301correct one yourself. 1113might choose the wrong one unless you load the correct one yourself.
302 1114
303You can chose to use a rather inefficient pure-perl implementation by 1115You can chose to use a pure-perl implementation by loading the
304loading the C<AnyEvent::Impl::Perl> module, but letting AnyEvent chose is 1116C<AnyEvent::Loop> module, which gives you similar behaviour
305generally better. 1117everywhere, but letting AnyEvent chose the model is generally better.
1118
1119=head2 MAINLOOP EMULATION
1120
1121Sometimes (often for short test scripts, or even standalone programs who
1122only want to use AnyEvent), you do not want to run a specific event loop.
1123
1124In that case, you can use a condition variable like this:
1125
1126 AnyEvent->condvar->recv;
1127
1128This has the effect of entering the event loop and looping forever.
1129
1130Note that usually your program has some exit condition, in which case
1131it is better to use the "traditional" approach of storing a condition
1132variable somewhere, waiting for it, and sending it when the program should
1133exit cleanly.
1134
1135
1136=head1 OTHER MODULES
1137
1138The following is a non-exhaustive list of additional modules that use
1139AnyEvent as a client and can therefore be mixed easily with other
1140AnyEvent modules and other event loops in the same program. Some of the
1141modules come as part of AnyEvent, the others are available via CPAN (see
1142L<http://search.cpan.org/search?m=module&q=anyevent%3A%3A*> for
1143a longer non-exhaustive list), and the list is heavily biased towards
1144modules of the AnyEvent author himself :)
1145
1146=over 4
1147
1148=item L<AnyEvent::Util>
1149
1150Contains various utility functions that replace often-used blocking
1151functions such as C<inet_aton> with event/callback-based versions.
1152
1153=item L<AnyEvent::Socket>
1154
1155Provides various utility functions for (internet protocol) sockets,
1156addresses and name resolution. Also functions to create non-blocking tcp
1157connections or tcp servers, with IPv6 and SRV record support and more.
1158
1159=item L<AnyEvent::Handle>
1160
1161Provide read and write buffers, manages watchers for reads and writes,
1162supports raw and formatted I/O, I/O queued and fully transparent and
1163non-blocking SSL/TLS (via L<AnyEvent::TLS>).
1164
1165=item L<AnyEvent::DNS>
1166
1167Provides rich asynchronous DNS resolver capabilities.
1168
1169=item L<AnyEvent::HTTP>, L<AnyEvent::IRC>, L<AnyEvent::XMPP>, L<AnyEvent::GPSD>, L<AnyEvent::IGS>, L<AnyEvent::FCP>
1170
1171Implement event-based interfaces to the protocols of the same name (for
1172the curious, IGS is the International Go Server and FCP is the Freenet
1173Client Protocol).
1174
1175=item L<AnyEvent::AIO>
1176
1177Truly asynchronous (as opposed to non-blocking) I/O, should be in the
1178toolbox of every event programmer. AnyEvent::AIO transparently fuses
1179L<IO::AIO> and AnyEvent together, giving AnyEvent access to event-based
1180file I/O, and much more.
1181
1182=item L<AnyEvent::Filesys::Notify>
1183
1184AnyEvent is good for non-blocking stuff, but it can't detect file or
1185path changes (e.g. "watch this directory for new files", "watch this
1186file for changes"). The L<AnyEvent::Filesys::Notify> module promises to
1187do just that in a portbale fashion, supporting inotify on GNU/Linux and
1188some weird, without doubt broken, stuff on OS X to monitor files. It can
1189fall back to blocking scans at regular intervals transparently on other
1190platforms, so it's about as portable as it gets.
1191
1192(I haven't used it myself, but I haven't heard anybody complaining about
1193it yet).
1194
1195=item L<AnyEvent::DBI>
1196
1197Executes L<DBI> requests asynchronously in a proxy process for you,
1198notifying you in an event-based way when the operation is finished.
1199
1200=item L<AnyEvent::HTTPD>
1201
1202A simple embedded webserver.
1203
1204=item L<AnyEvent::FastPing>
1205
1206The fastest ping in the west.
1207
1208=item L<Coro>
1209
1210Has special support for AnyEvent via L<Coro::AnyEvent>, which allows you
1211to simply invert the flow control - don't call us, we will call you:
1212
1213 async {
1214 Coro::AnyEvent::sleep 5; # creates a 5s timer and waits for it
1215 print "5 seconds later!\n";
1216
1217 Coro::AnyEvent::readable *STDIN; # uses an I/O watcher
1218 my $line = <STDIN>; # works for ttys
1219
1220 AnyEvent::HTTP::http_get "url", Coro::rouse_cb;
1221 my ($body, $hdr) = Coro::rouse_wait;
1222 };
1223
1224=back
306 1225
307=cut 1226=cut
308 1227
309package AnyEvent; 1228package AnyEvent;
310 1229
311no warnings; 1230# basically a tuned-down version of common::sense
312use strict; 1231sub common_sense {
1232 # from common:.sense 3.5
1233 local $^W;
1234 ${^WARNING_BITS} ^= ${^WARNING_BITS} ^ "\x3c\x3f\x33\x00\x0f\xf0\x0f\xc0\xf0\xfc\x33\x00";
1235 # use strict vars subs - NO UTF-8, as Util.pm doesn't like this atm. (uts46data.pl)
1236 $^H |= 0x00000600;
1237}
313 1238
1239BEGIN { AnyEvent::common_sense }
1240
314use Carp; 1241use Carp ();
315 1242
316our $VERSION = '3.0'; 1243our $VERSION = '7.04';
317our $MODEL; 1244our $MODEL;
318
319our $AUTOLOAD;
320our @ISA; 1245our @ISA;
321
322our $verbose = $ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_VERBOSE}*1;
323
324our @REGISTRY; 1246our @REGISTRY;
1247our $VERBOSE;
1248our %PROTOCOL; # (ipv4|ipv6) => (1|2), higher numbers are preferred
1249our $MAX_SIGNAL_LATENCY = $ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_MAX_SIGNAL_LATENCY} || 10; # executes after the BEGIN block below (tainting!)
325 1250
1251BEGIN {
1252 require "AnyEvent/constants.pl";
1253
1254 eval "sub TAINT (){" . (${^TAINT}*1) . "}";
1255
1256 delete @ENV{grep /^PERL_ANYEVENT_/, keys %ENV}
1257 if ${^TAINT};
1258
1259 $ENV{"PERL_ANYEVENT_$_"} = $ENV{"AE_$_"}
1260 for grep s/^AE_// && !exists $ENV{"PERL_ANYEVENT_$_"}, keys %ENV;
1261
1262 @ENV{grep /^PERL_ANYEVENT_/, keys %ENV} = ()
1263 if ${^TAINT};
1264
1265 # $ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_xxx} now valid
1266
1267 $VERBOSE = length $ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_VERBOSE} ? $ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_VERBOSE}*1 : 4;
1268
1269 my $idx;
1270 $PROTOCOL{$_} = ++$idx
1271 for reverse split /\s*,\s*/,
1272 $ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_PROTOCOLS} || "ipv4,ipv6";
1273}
1274
1275our @post_detect;
1276
1277sub post_detect(&) {
1278 my ($cb) = @_;
1279
1280 push @post_detect, $cb;
1281
1282 defined wantarray
1283 ? bless \$cb, "AnyEvent::Util::postdetect"
1284 : ()
1285}
1286
1287sub AnyEvent::Util::postdetect::DESTROY {
1288 @post_detect = grep $_ != ${$_[0]}, @post_detect;
1289}
1290
1291our $POSTPONE_W;
1292our @POSTPONE;
1293
1294sub _postpone_exec {
1295 undef $POSTPONE_W;
1296
1297 &{ shift @POSTPONE }
1298 while @POSTPONE;
1299}
1300
1301sub postpone(&) {
1302 push @POSTPONE, shift;
1303
1304 $POSTPONE_W ||= AE::timer (0, 0, \&_postpone_exec);
1305
1306 ()
1307}
1308
1309sub log($$;@) {
1310 # only load the big bloated module when we actually are about to log something
1311 if ($_[0] <= ($VERBOSE || 1)) { # also catches non-numeric levels(!) and fatal
1312 local ($!, $@);
1313 require AnyEvent::Log; # among other things, sets $VERBOSE to 9
1314 # AnyEvent::Log overwrites this function
1315 goto &log;
1316 }
1317
1318 0 # not logged
1319}
1320
1321sub _logger($;$) {
1322 my ($level, $renabled) = @_;
1323
1324 $$renabled = $level <= $VERBOSE;
1325
1326 my $logger = [(caller)[0], $level, $renabled];
1327
1328 $AnyEvent::Log::LOGGER{$logger+0} = $logger;
1329
1330# return unless defined wantarray;
1331#
1332# require AnyEvent::Util;
1333# my $guard = AnyEvent::Util::guard (sub {
1334# # "clean up"
1335# delete $LOGGER{$logger+0};
1336# });
1337#
1338# sub {
1339# return 0 unless $$renabled;
1340#
1341# $guard if 0; # keep guard alive, but don't cause runtime overhead
1342# require AnyEvent::Log unless $AnyEvent::Log::VERSION;
1343# package AnyEvent::Log;
1344# _log ($logger->[0], $level, @_) # logger->[0] has been converted at load time
1345# }
1346}
1347
1348if (length $ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_LOG}) {
1349 require AnyEvent::Log; # AnyEvent::Log does the thing for us
1350}
1351
326my @models = ( 1352our @models = (
327 [Coro::EV:: => AnyEvent::Impl::CoroEV::],
328 [EV:: => AnyEvent::Impl::EV::], 1353 [EV:: => AnyEvent::Impl::EV::],
329 [Coro::Event:: => AnyEvent::Impl::CoroEvent::], 1354 [AnyEvent::Loop:: => AnyEvent::Impl::Perl::],
1355 # everything below here will not (normally) be autoprobed
1356 # as the pure perl backend should work everywhere
1357 # and is usually faster
1358 [Irssi:: => AnyEvent::Impl::Irssi::], # Irssi has a bogus "Event" package, so msut be near the top
330 [Event:: => AnyEvent::Impl::Event::], 1359 [Event:: => AnyEvent::Impl::Event::], # slow, stable
331 [Glib:: => AnyEvent::Impl::Glib::], 1360 [Glib:: => AnyEvent::Impl::Glib::], # becomes extremely slow with many watchers
1361 # everything below here should not be autoloaded
1362 [Event::Lib:: => AnyEvent::Impl::EventLib::], # too buggy
1363 [Tk:: => AnyEvent::Impl::Tk::], # crashes with many handles
1364 [Qt:: => AnyEvent::Impl::Qt::], # requires special main program
1365 [POE::Kernel:: => AnyEvent::Impl::POE::], # lasciate ogni speranza
332 [Tk:: => AnyEvent::Impl::Tk::], 1366 [Wx:: => AnyEvent::Impl::POE::],
333 [AnyEvent::Impl::Perl:: => AnyEvent::Impl::Perl::], 1367 [Prima:: => AnyEvent::Impl::POE::],
1368 [IO::Async::Loop:: => AnyEvent::Impl::IOAsync::], # a bitch to autodetect
1369 [Cocoa::EventLoop:: => AnyEvent::Impl::Cocoa::],
1370 [FLTK:: => AnyEvent::Impl::FLTK::],
334); 1371);
335 1372
336our %method = map +($_ => 1), qw(io timer condvar broadcast wait signal one_event DESTROY); 1373our @isa_hook;
1374
1375sub _isa_set {
1376 my @pkg = ("AnyEvent", (map $_->[0], grep defined, @isa_hook), $MODEL);
1377
1378 @{"$pkg[$_-1]::ISA"} = $pkg[$_]
1379 for 1 .. $#pkg;
1380
1381 grep $_ && $_->[1], @isa_hook
1382 and AE::_reset ();
1383}
1384
1385# used for hooking AnyEvent::Strict and AnyEvent::Debug::Wrap into the class hierarchy
1386sub _isa_hook($$;$) {
1387 my ($i, $pkg, $reset_ae) = @_;
1388
1389 $isa_hook[$i] = $pkg ? [$pkg, $reset_ae] : undef;
1390
1391 _isa_set;
1392}
1393
1394# all autoloaded methods reserve the complete glob, not just the method slot.
1395# due to bugs in perls method cache implementation.
1396our @methods = qw(io timer time now now_update signal child idle condvar);
337 1397
338sub detect() { 1398sub detect() {
1399 return $MODEL if $MODEL; # some programs keep references to detect
1400
1401 # IO::Async::Loop::AnyEvent is extremely evil, refuse to work with it
1402 # the author knows about the problems and what it does to AnyEvent as a whole
1403 # (and the ability of others to use AnyEvent), but simply wants to abuse AnyEvent
1404 # anyway.
1405 AnyEvent::log fatal => "IO::Async::Loop::AnyEvent detected - that module is broken by\n"
1406 . "design, abuses internals and breaks AnyEvent - will not continue."
1407 if exists $INC{"IO/Async/Loop/AnyEvent.pm"};
1408
1409 local $!; # for good measure
1410 local $SIG{__DIE__}; # we use eval
1411
1412 # free some memory
1413 *detect = sub () { $MODEL };
1414 # undef &func doesn't correctly update the method cache. grmbl.
1415 # so we delete the whole glob. grmbl.
1416 # otoh, perl doesn't let me undef an active usb, but it lets me free
1417 # a glob with an active sub. hrm. i hope it works, but perl is
1418 # usually buggy in this department. sigh.
1419 delete @{"AnyEvent::"}{@methods};
1420 undef @methods;
1421
1422 if ($ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_MODEL} =~ /^([a-zA-Z0-9:]+)$/) {
1423 my $model = $1;
1424 $model = "AnyEvent::Impl::$model" unless $model =~ s/::$//;
1425 if (eval "require $model") {
1426 AnyEvent::log 7 => "Loaded model '$model' (forced by \$ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_MODEL}), using it.";
1427 $MODEL = $model;
1428 } else {
1429 AnyEvent::log 4 => "Unable to load model '$model' (from \$ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_MODEL}):\n$@";
1430 }
1431 }
1432
1433 # check for already loaded models
339 unless ($MODEL) { 1434 unless ($MODEL) {
340 no strict 'refs';
341
342 # check for already loaded models
343 for (@REGISTRY, @models) { 1435 for (@REGISTRY, @models) {
344 my ($package, $model) = @$_; 1436 my ($package, $model) = @$_;
345 if (${"$package\::VERSION"} > 0) { 1437 if (${"$package\::VERSION"} > 0) {
346 if (eval "require $model") { 1438 if (eval "require $model") {
1439 AnyEvent::log 7 => "Autodetected model '$model', using it.";
347 $MODEL = $model; 1440 $MODEL = $model;
348 warn "AnyEvent: found model '$model', using it.\n" if $verbose > 1; 1441 last;
1442 } else {
1443 AnyEvent::log 8 => "Detected event loop $package, but cannot load '$model', skipping: $@";
1444 }
1445 }
1446 }
1447
1448 unless ($MODEL) {
1449 # try to autoload a model
1450 for (@REGISTRY, @models) {
1451 my ($package, $model) = @$_;
1452 if (
1453 eval "require $package"
1454 and ${"$package\::VERSION"} > 0
1455 and eval "require $model"
1456 ) {
1457 AnyEvent::log 7 => "Autoloaded model '$model', using it.";
1458 $MODEL = $model;
349 last; 1459 last;
350 } 1460 }
351 } 1461 }
1462
1463 $MODEL
1464 or AnyEvent::log fatal => "Backend autodetection failed - did you properly install AnyEvent?";
352 } 1465 }
1466 }
353 1467
354 unless ($MODEL) { 1468 # free memory only needed for probing
355 # try to load a model 1469 undef @models;
1470 undef @REGISTRY;
356 1471
357 for (@REGISTRY, @models) { 1472 push @{"$MODEL\::ISA"}, "AnyEvent::Base";
358 my ($package, $model) = @$_; 1473
359 if (eval "require $package" 1474 # now nuke some methods that are overridden by the backend.
360 and ${"$package\::VERSION"} > 0 1475 # SUPER usage is not allowed in these.
361 and eval "require $model") { 1476 for (qw(time signal child idle)) {
362 $MODEL = $model; 1477 undef &{"AnyEvent::Base::$_"}
363 warn "AnyEvent: autoprobed and loaded model '$model', using it.\n" if $verbose > 1; 1478 if defined &{"$MODEL\::$_"};
1479 }
1480
1481 _isa_set;
1482
1483 # we're officially open!
1484
1485 if ($ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_STRICT}) {
1486 require AnyEvent::Strict;
1487 }
1488
1489 if ($ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_DEBUG_WRAP}) {
1490 require AnyEvent::Debug;
1491 AnyEvent::Debug::wrap ($ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_DEBUG_WRAP});
1492 }
1493
1494 if (length $ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_DEBUG_SHELL}) {
1495 require AnyEvent::Socket;
1496 require AnyEvent::Debug;
1497
1498 my $shell = $ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_DEBUG_SHELL};
1499 $shell =~ s/\$\$/$$/g;
1500
1501 my ($host, $service) = AnyEvent::Socket::parse_hostport ($shell);
1502 $AnyEvent::Debug::SHELL = AnyEvent::Debug::shell ($host, $service);
1503 }
1504
1505 # now the anyevent environment is set up as the user told us to, so
1506 # call the actual user code - post detects
1507
1508 (shift @post_detect)->() while @post_detect;
1509 undef @post_detect;
1510
1511 *post_detect = sub(&) {
1512 shift->();
1513
1514 undef
1515 };
1516
1517 $MODEL
1518}
1519
1520for my $name (@methods) {
1521 *$name = sub {
1522 detect;
1523 # we use goto because
1524 # a) it makes the thunk more transparent
1525 # b) it allows us to delete the thunk later
1526 goto &{ UNIVERSAL::can AnyEvent => "SUPER::$name" }
1527 };
1528}
1529
1530# utility function to dup a filehandle. this is used by many backends
1531# to support binding more than one watcher per filehandle (they usually
1532# allow only one watcher per fd, so we dup it to get a different one).
1533sub _dupfh($$;$$) {
1534 my ($poll, $fh, $r, $w) = @_;
1535
1536 # cygwin requires the fh mode to be matching, unix doesn't
1537 my ($rw, $mode) = $poll eq "r" ? ($r, "<&") : ($w, ">&");
1538
1539 open my $fh2, $mode, $fh
1540 or die "AnyEvent->io: cannot dup() filehandle in mode '$poll': $!,";
1541
1542 # we assume CLOEXEC is already set by perl in all important cases
1543
1544 ($fh2, $rw)
1545}
1546
1547=head1 SIMPLIFIED AE API
1548
1549Starting with version 5.0, AnyEvent officially supports a second, much
1550simpler, API that is designed to reduce the calling, typing and memory
1551overhead by using function call syntax and a fixed number of parameters.
1552
1553See the L<AE> manpage for details.
1554
1555=cut
1556
1557package AE;
1558
1559our $VERSION = $AnyEvent::VERSION;
1560
1561sub _reset() {
1562 eval q{
1563 # fall back to the main API by default - backends and AnyEvent::Base
1564 # implementations can overwrite these.
1565
1566 sub io($$$) {
1567 AnyEvent->io (fh => $_[0], poll => $_[1] ? "w" : "r", cb => $_[2])
1568 }
1569
1570 sub timer($$$) {
1571 AnyEvent->timer (after => $_[0], interval => $_[1], cb => $_[2])
1572 }
1573
1574 sub signal($$) {
1575 AnyEvent->signal (signal => $_[0], cb => $_[1])
1576 }
1577
1578 sub child($$) {
1579 AnyEvent->child (pid => $_[0], cb => $_[1])
1580 }
1581
1582 sub idle($) {
1583 AnyEvent->idle (cb => $_[0]);
1584 }
1585
1586 sub cv(;&) {
1587 AnyEvent->condvar (@_ ? (cb => $_[0]) : ())
1588 }
1589
1590 sub now() {
1591 AnyEvent->now
1592 }
1593
1594 sub now_update() {
1595 AnyEvent->now_update
1596 }
1597
1598 sub time() {
1599 AnyEvent->time
1600 }
1601
1602 *postpone = \&AnyEvent::postpone;
1603 *log = \&AnyEvent::log;
1604 };
1605 die if $@;
1606}
1607
1608BEGIN { _reset }
1609
1610package AnyEvent::Base;
1611
1612# default implementations for many methods
1613
1614sub time {
1615 eval q{ # poor man's autoloading {}
1616 # probe for availability of Time::HiRes
1617 if (eval "use Time::HiRes (); Time::HiRes::time (); 1") {
1618 *time = sub { Time::HiRes::time () };
1619 *AE::time = \& Time::HiRes::time ;
1620 *now = \&time;
1621 AnyEvent::log 8 => "using Time::HiRes for sub-second timing accuracy.";
1622 # if (eval "use POSIX (); (POSIX::times())...
1623 } else {
1624 *time = sub { CORE::time };
1625 *AE::time = sub (){ CORE::time };
1626 *now = \&time;
1627 AnyEvent::log 3 => "Using built-in time(), no sub-second resolution!";
1628 }
1629 };
1630 die if $@;
1631
1632 &time
1633}
1634
1635*now = \&time;
1636sub now_update { }
1637
1638sub _poll {
1639 Carp::croak "$AnyEvent::MODEL does not support blocking waits. Caught";
1640}
1641
1642# default implementation for ->condvar
1643# in fact, the default should not be overwritten
1644
1645sub condvar {
1646 eval q{ # poor man's autoloading {}
1647 *condvar = sub {
1648 bless { @_ == 3 ? (_ae_cb => $_[2]) : () }, "AnyEvent::CondVar"
1649 };
1650
1651 *AE::cv = sub (;&) {
1652 bless { @_ ? (_ae_cb => shift) : () }, "AnyEvent::CondVar"
1653 };
1654 };
1655 die if $@;
1656
1657 &condvar
1658}
1659
1660# default implementation for ->signal
1661
1662our $HAVE_ASYNC_INTERRUPT;
1663
1664sub _have_async_interrupt() {
1665 $HAVE_ASYNC_INTERRUPT = 1*(!$ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_AVOID_ASYNC_INTERRUPT}
1666 && eval "use Async::Interrupt 1.02 (); 1")
1667 unless defined $HAVE_ASYNC_INTERRUPT;
1668
1669 $HAVE_ASYNC_INTERRUPT
1670}
1671
1672our ($SIGPIPE_R, $SIGPIPE_W, %SIG_CB, %SIG_EV, $SIG_IO);
1673our (%SIG_ASY, %SIG_ASY_W);
1674our ($SIG_COUNT, $SIG_TW);
1675
1676# install a dummy wakeup watcher to reduce signal catching latency
1677# used by Impls
1678sub _sig_add() {
1679 unless ($SIG_COUNT++) {
1680 # try to align timer on a full-second boundary, if possible
1681 my $NOW = AE::now;
1682
1683 $SIG_TW = AE::timer
1684 $MAX_SIGNAL_LATENCY - ($NOW - int $NOW),
1685 $MAX_SIGNAL_LATENCY,
1686 sub { } # just for the PERL_ASYNC_CHECK
1687 ;
1688 }
1689}
1690
1691sub _sig_del {
1692 undef $SIG_TW
1693 unless --$SIG_COUNT;
1694}
1695
1696our $_sig_name_init; $_sig_name_init = sub {
1697 eval q{ # poor man's autoloading {}
1698 undef $_sig_name_init;
1699
1700 if (_have_async_interrupt) {
1701 *sig2num = \&Async::Interrupt::sig2num;
1702 *sig2name = \&Async::Interrupt::sig2name;
1703 } else {
1704 require Config;
1705
1706 my %signame2num;
1707 @signame2num{ split ' ', $Config::Config{sig_name} }
1708 = split ' ', $Config::Config{sig_num};
1709
1710 my @signum2name;
1711 @signum2name[values %signame2num] = keys %signame2num;
1712
1713 *sig2num = sub($) {
1714 $_[0] > 0 ? shift : $signame2num{+shift}
1715 };
1716 *sig2name = sub ($) {
1717 $_[0] > 0 ? $signum2name[+shift] : shift
1718 };
1719 }
1720 };
1721 die if $@;
1722};
1723
1724sub sig2num ($) { &$_sig_name_init; &sig2num }
1725sub sig2name($) { &$_sig_name_init; &sig2name }
1726
1727sub signal {
1728 eval q{ # poor man's autoloading {}
1729 # probe for availability of Async::Interrupt
1730 if (_have_async_interrupt) {
1731 AnyEvent::log 8 => "Using Async::Interrupt for race-free signal handling.";
1732
1733 $SIGPIPE_R = new Async::Interrupt::EventPipe;
1734 $SIG_IO = AE::io $SIGPIPE_R->fileno, 0, \&_signal_exec;
1735
1736 } else {
1737 AnyEvent::log 8 => "Using emulated perl signal handling with latency timer.";
1738
1739 if (AnyEvent::WIN32) {
1740 require AnyEvent::Util;
1741
1742 ($SIGPIPE_R, $SIGPIPE_W) = AnyEvent::Util::portable_pipe ();
1743 AnyEvent::Util::fh_nonblocking ($SIGPIPE_R, 1) if $SIGPIPE_R;
1744 AnyEvent::Util::fh_nonblocking ($SIGPIPE_W, 1) if $SIGPIPE_W; # just in case
1745 } else {
1746 pipe $SIGPIPE_R, $SIGPIPE_W;
1747 fcntl $SIGPIPE_R, AnyEvent::F_SETFL, AnyEvent::O_NONBLOCK if $SIGPIPE_R;
1748 fcntl $SIGPIPE_W, AnyEvent::F_SETFL, AnyEvent::O_NONBLOCK if $SIGPIPE_W; # just in case
1749
1750 # not strictly required, as $^F is normally 2, but let's make sure...
1751 fcntl $SIGPIPE_R, AnyEvent::F_SETFD, AnyEvent::FD_CLOEXEC;
1752 fcntl $SIGPIPE_W, AnyEvent::F_SETFD, AnyEvent::FD_CLOEXEC;
1753 }
1754
1755 $SIGPIPE_R
1756 or Carp::croak "AnyEvent: unable to create a signal reporting pipe: $!\n";
1757
1758 $SIG_IO = AE::io $SIGPIPE_R, 0, \&_signal_exec;
1759 }
1760
1761 *signal = $HAVE_ASYNC_INTERRUPT
1762 ? sub {
1763 my (undef, %arg) = @_;
1764
1765 # async::interrupt
1766 my $signal = sig2num $arg{signal};
1767 $SIG_CB{$signal}{$arg{cb}} = $arg{cb};
1768
1769 $SIG_ASY{$signal} ||= new Async::Interrupt
1770 cb => sub { undef $SIG_EV{$signal} },
1771 signal => $signal,
1772 pipe => [$SIGPIPE_R->filenos],
1773 pipe_autodrain => 0,
364 last; 1774 ;
1775
1776 bless [$signal, $arg{cb}], "AnyEvent::Base::signal"
1777 }
1778 : sub {
1779 my (undef, %arg) = @_;
1780
1781 # pure perl
1782 my $signal = sig2name $arg{signal};
1783 $SIG_CB{$signal}{$arg{cb}} = $arg{cb};
1784
1785 $SIG{$signal} ||= sub {
1786 local $!;
1787 syswrite $SIGPIPE_W, "\x00", 1 unless %SIG_EV;
1788 undef $SIG_EV{$signal};
1789 };
1790
1791 # can't do signal processing without introducing races in pure perl,
1792 # so limit the signal latency.
1793 _sig_add;
1794
1795 bless [$signal, $arg{cb}], "AnyEvent::Base::signal"
1796 }
1797 ;
1798
1799 *AnyEvent::Base::signal::DESTROY = sub {
1800 my ($signal, $cb) = @{$_[0]};
1801
1802 _sig_del;
1803
1804 delete $SIG_CB{$signal}{$cb};
1805
1806 $HAVE_ASYNC_INTERRUPT
1807 ? delete $SIG_ASY{$signal}
1808 : # delete doesn't work with older perls - they then
1809 # print weird messages, or just unconditionally exit
1810 # instead of getting the default action.
1811 undef $SIG{$signal}
1812 unless keys %{ $SIG_CB{$signal} };
1813 };
1814
1815 *_signal_exec = sub {
1816 $HAVE_ASYNC_INTERRUPT
1817 ? $SIGPIPE_R->drain
1818 : sysread $SIGPIPE_R, (my $dummy), 9;
1819
1820 while (%SIG_EV) {
1821 for (keys %SIG_EV) {
1822 delete $SIG_EV{$_};
1823 &$_ for values %{ $SIG_CB{$_} || {} };
365 } 1824 }
366 } 1825 }
367
368 $MODEL
369 or die "No event module selected for AnyEvent and autodetect failed. Install any one of these modules: EV (or Coro+EV), Event (or Coro+Event), Glib or Tk.";
370 } 1826 };
371
372 unshift @ISA, $MODEL;
373 push @{"$MODEL\::ISA"}, "AnyEvent::Base";
374 }
375
376 $MODEL
377}
378
379sub AUTOLOAD {
380 (my $func = $AUTOLOAD) =~ s/.*://;
381
382 $method{$func}
383 or croak "$func: not a valid method for AnyEvent objects";
384
385 detect unless $MODEL;
386
387 my $class = shift;
388 $class->$func (@_);
389}
390
391package AnyEvent::Base;
392
393# default implementation for ->condvar, ->wait, ->broadcast
394
395sub condvar {
396 bless \my $flag, "AnyEvent::Base::CondVar"
397}
398
399sub AnyEvent::Base::CondVar::broadcast {
400 ${$_[0]}++;
401}
402
403sub AnyEvent::Base::CondVar::wait {
404 AnyEvent->one_event while !${$_[0]};
405}
406
407# default implementation for ->signal
408
409our %SIG_CB;
410
411sub signal {
412 my (undef, %arg) = @_;
413
414 my $signal = uc $arg{signal}
415 or Carp::croak "required option 'signal' is missing";
416
417 $SIG_CB{$signal}{$arg{cb}} = $arg{cb};
418 $SIG{$signal} ||= sub {
419 $_->() for values %{ $SIG_CB{$signal} || {} };
420 }; 1827 };
1828 die if $@;
421 1829
422 bless [$signal, $arg{cb}], "AnyEvent::Base::Signal" 1830 &signal
423}
424
425sub AnyEvent::Base::Signal::DESTROY {
426 my ($signal, $cb) = @{$_[0]};
427
428 delete $SIG_CB{$signal}{$cb};
429
430 $SIG{$signal} = 'DEFAULT' unless keys %{ $SIG_CB{$signal} };
431} 1831}
432 1832
433# default implementation for ->child 1833# default implementation for ->child
434 1834
435our %PID_CB; 1835our %PID_CB;
436our $CHLD_W; 1836our $CHLD_W;
437our $CHLD_DELAY_W; 1837our $CHLD_DELAY_W;
438our $PID_IDLE;
439our $WNOHANG;
440 1838
441sub _child_wait { 1839# used by many Impl's
442 while (0 < (my $pid = waitpid -1, $WNOHANG)) { 1840sub _emit_childstatus($$) {
1841 my (undef, $rpid, $rstatus) = @_;
1842
1843 $_->($rpid, $rstatus)
443 $_->($pid, $?) for (values %{ $PID_CB{$pid} || {} }), 1844 for values %{ $PID_CB{$rpid} || {} },
444 (values %{ $PID_CB{0} || {} }); 1845 values %{ $PID_CB{0} || {} };
1846}
1847
1848sub child {
1849 eval q{ # poor man's autoloading {}
1850 *_sigchld = sub {
1851 my $pid;
1852
1853 AnyEvent->_emit_childstatus ($pid, $?)
1854 while ($pid = waitpid -1, WNOHANG) > 0;
1855 };
1856
1857 *child = sub {
1858 my (undef, %arg) = @_;
1859
1860 my $pid = $arg{pid};
1861 my $cb = $arg{cb};
1862
1863 $PID_CB{$pid}{$cb+0} = $cb;
1864
1865 unless ($CHLD_W) {
1866 $CHLD_W = AE::signal CHLD => \&_sigchld;
1867 # child could be a zombie already, so make at least one round
1868 &_sigchld;
1869 }
1870
1871 bless [$pid, $cb+0], "AnyEvent::Base::child"
1872 };
1873
1874 *AnyEvent::Base::child::DESTROY = sub {
1875 my ($pid, $icb) = @{$_[0]};
1876
1877 delete $PID_CB{$pid}{$icb};
1878 delete $PID_CB{$pid} unless keys %{ $PID_CB{$pid} };
1879
1880 undef $CHLD_W unless keys %PID_CB;
1881 };
1882 };
1883 die if $@;
1884
1885 &child
1886}
1887
1888# idle emulation is done by simply using a timer, regardless
1889# of whether the process is idle or not, and not letting
1890# the callback use more than 50% of the time.
1891sub idle {
1892 eval q{ # poor man's autoloading {}
1893 *idle = sub {
1894 my (undef, %arg) = @_;
1895
1896 my ($cb, $w, $rcb) = $arg{cb};
1897
1898 $rcb = sub {
1899 if ($cb) {
1900 $w = AE::time;
1901 &$cb;
1902 $w = AE::time - $w;
1903
1904 # never use more then 50% of the time for the idle watcher,
1905 # within some limits
1906 $w = 0.0001 if $w < 0.0001;
1907 $w = 5 if $w > 5;
1908
1909 $w = AE::timer $w, 0, $rcb;
1910 } else {
1911 # clean up...
1912 undef $w;
1913 undef $rcb;
1914 }
1915 };
1916
1917 $w = AE::timer 0.05, 0, $rcb;
1918
1919 bless \\$cb, "AnyEvent::Base::idle"
1920 };
1921
1922 *AnyEvent::Base::idle::DESTROY = sub {
1923 undef $${$_[0]};
1924 };
1925 };
1926 die if $@;
1927
1928 &idle
1929}
1930
1931package AnyEvent::CondVar;
1932
1933our @ISA = AnyEvent::CondVar::Base::;
1934
1935# only to be used for subclassing
1936sub new {
1937 my $class = shift;
1938 bless AnyEvent->condvar (@_), $class
1939}
1940
1941package AnyEvent::CondVar::Base;
1942
1943#use overload
1944# '&{}' => sub { my $self = shift; sub { $self->send (@_) } },
1945# fallback => 1;
1946
1947# save 300+ kilobytes by dirtily hardcoding overloading
1948${"AnyEvent::CondVar::Base::OVERLOAD"}{dummy}++; # Register with magic by touching.
1949*{'AnyEvent::CondVar::Base::()'} = sub { }; # "Make it findable via fetchmethod."
1950*{'AnyEvent::CondVar::Base::(&{}'} = sub { my $self = shift; sub { $self->send (@_) } }; # &{}
1951${'AnyEvent::CondVar::Base::()'} = 1; # fallback
1952
1953our $WAITING;
1954
1955sub _send {
1956 # nop
1957}
1958
1959sub _wait {
1960 AnyEvent->_poll until $_[0]{_ae_sent};
1961}
1962
1963sub send {
1964 my $cv = shift;
1965 $cv->{_ae_sent} = [@_];
1966 (delete $cv->{_ae_cb})->($cv) if $cv->{_ae_cb};
1967 $cv->_send;
1968}
1969
1970sub croak {
1971 $_[0]{_ae_croak} = $_[1];
1972 $_[0]->send;
1973}
1974
1975sub ready {
1976 $_[0]{_ae_sent}
1977}
1978
1979sub recv {
1980 unless ($_[0]{_ae_sent}) {
1981 $WAITING
1982 and Carp::croak "AnyEvent::CondVar: recursive blocking wait attempted";
1983
1984 local $WAITING = 1;
1985 $_[0]->_wait;
445 } 1986 }
446 1987
447 undef $PID_IDLE; 1988 $_[0]{_ae_croak}
448} 1989 and Carp::croak $_[0]{_ae_croak};
449 1990
450sub _sigchld { 1991 wantarray
451 # make sure we deliver these changes "synchronous" with the event loop. 1992 ? @{ $_[0]{_ae_sent} }
452 $CHLD_DELAY_W ||= AnyEvent->timer (after => 0, cb => sub { 1993 : $_[0]{_ae_sent}[0]
453 undef $CHLD_DELAY_W;
454 &_child_wait;
455 });
456} 1994}
457 1995
458sub child { 1996sub cb {
459 my (undef, %arg) = @_; 1997 my $cv = shift;
460 1998
461 defined (my $pid = $arg{pid} + 0) 1999 @_
462 or Carp::croak "required option 'pid' is missing"; 2000 and $cv->{_ae_cb} = shift
2001 and $cv->{_ae_sent}
2002 and (delete $cv->{_ae_cb})->($cv);
463 2003
464 $PID_CB{$pid}{$arg{cb}} = $arg{cb}; 2004 $cv->{_ae_cb}
465
466 unless ($WNOHANG) {
467 $WNOHANG = eval { require POSIX; &POSIX::WNOHANG } || 1;
468 }
469
470 unless ($CHLD_W) {
471 $CHLD_W = AnyEvent->signal (signal => 'CHLD', cb => \&_sigchld);
472 # child could be a zombie already, so make at least one round
473 &_sigchld;
474 }
475
476 bless [$pid, $arg{cb}], "AnyEvent::Base::Child"
477} 2005}
478 2006
479sub AnyEvent::Base::Child::DESTROY { 2007sub begin {
480 my ($pid, $cb) = @{$_[0]}; 2008 ++$_[0]{_ae_counter};
481 2009 $_[0]{_ae_end_cb} = $_[1] if @_ > 1;
482 delete $PID_CB{$pid}{$cb};
483 delete $PID_CB{$pid} unless keys %{ $PID_CB{$pid} };
484
485 undef $CHLD_W unless keys %PID_CB;
486} 2010}
2011
2012sub end {
2013 return if --$_[0]{_ae_counter};
2014 &{ $_[0]{_ae_end_cb} || sub { $_[0]->send } };
2015}
2016
2017# undocumented/compatibility with pre-3.4
2018*broadcast = \&send;
2019*wait = \&recv;
2020
2021=head1 ERROR AND EXCEPTION HANDLING
2022
2023In general, AnyEvent does not do any error handling - it relies on the
2024caller to do that if required. The L<AnyEvent::Strict> module (see also
2025the C<PERL_ANYEVENT_STRICT> environment variable, below) provides strict
2026checking of all AnyEvent methods, however, which is highly useful during
2027development.
2028
2029As for exception handling (i.e. runtime errors and exceptions thrown while
2030executing a callback), this is not only highly event-loop specific, but
2031also not in any way wrapped by this module, as this is the job of the main
2032program.
2033
2034The pure perl event loop simply re-throws the exception (usually
2035within C<< condvar->recv >>), the L<Event> and L<EV> modules call C<<
2036$Event/EV::DIED->() >>, L<Glib> uses C<< install_exception_handler >> and
2037so on.
2038
2039=head1 ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
2040
2041AnyEvent supports a number of environment variables that tune the
2042runtime behaviour. They are usually evaluated when AnyEvent is
2043loaded, initialised, or a submodule that uses them is loaded. Many of
2044them also cause AnyEvent to load additional modules - for example,
2045C<PERL_ANYEVENT_DEBUG_WRAP> causes the L<AnyEvent::Debug> module to be
2046loaded.
2047
2048All the environment variables documented here start with
2049C<PERL_ANYEVENT_>, which is what AnyEvent considers its own
2050namespace. Other modules are encouraged (but by no means required) to use
2051C<PERL_ANYEVENT_SUBMODULE> if they have registered the AnyEvent::Submodule
2052namespace on CPAN, for any submodule. For example, L<AnyEvent::HTTP> could
2053be expected to use C<PERL_ANYEVENT_HTTP_PROXY> (it should not access env
2054variables starting with C<AE_>, see below).
2055
2056All variables can also be set via the C<AE_> prefix, that is, instead
2057of setting C<PERL_ANYEVENT_VERBOSE> you can also set C<AE_VERBOSE>. In
2058case there is a clash btween anyevent and another program that uses
2059C<AE_something> you can set the corresponding C<PERL_ANYEVENT_something>
2060variable to the empty string, as those variables take precedence.
2061
2062When AnyEvent is first loaded, it copies all C<AE_xxx> env variables
2063to their C<PERL_ANYEVENT_xxx> counterpart unless that variable already
2064exists. If taint mode is on, then AnyEvent will remove I<all> environment
2065variables starting with C<PERL_ANYEVENT_> from C<%ENV> (or replace them
2066with C<undef> or the empty string, if the corresaponding C<AE_> variable
2067is set).
2068
2069The exact algorithm is currently:
2070
2071 1. if taint mode enabled, delete all PERL_ANYEVENT_xyz variables from %ENV
2072 2. copy over AE_xyz to PERL_ANYEVENT_xyz unless the latter alraedy exists
2073 3. if taint mode enabled, set all PERL_ANYEVENT_xyz variables to undef.
2074
2075This ensures that child processes will not see the C<AE_> variables.
2076
2077The following environment variables are currently known to AnyEvent:
2078
2079=over 4
2080
2081=item C<PERL_ANYEVENT_VERBOSE>
2082
2083By default, AnyEvent will log messages with loglevel C<4> (C<error>) or
2084higher (see L<AnyEvent::Log>). You can set this environment variable to a
2085numerical loglevel to make AnyEvent more (or less) talkative.
2086
2087If you want to do more than just set the global logging level
2088you should have a look at C<PERL_ANYEVENT_LOG>, which allows much more
2089complex specifications.
2090
2091When set to C<0> (C<off>), then no messages whatsoever will be logged with
2092everything else at defaults.
2093
2094When set to C<5> or higher (C<warn>), AnyEvent warns about unexpected
2095conditions, such as not being able to load the event model specified by
2096C<PERL_ANYEVENT_MODEL>, or a guard callback throwing an exception - this
2097is the minimum recommended level for use during development.
2098
2099When set to C<7> or higher (info), AnyEvent reports which event model it
2100chooses.
2101
2102When set to C<8> or higher (debug), then AnyEvent will report extra
2103information on which optional modules it loads and how it implements
2104certain features.
2105
2106=item C<PERL_ANYEVENT_LOG>
2107
2108Accepts rather complex logging specifications. For example, you could log
2109all C<debug> messages of some module to stderr, warnings and above to
2110stderr, and errors and above to syslog, with:
2111
2112 PERL_ANYEVENT_LOG=Some::Module=debug,+log:filter=warn,+%syslog:%syslog=error,syslog
2113
2114For the rather extensive details, see L<AnyEvent::Log>.
2115
2116This variable is evaluated when AnyEvent (or L<AnyEvent::Log>) is loaded,
2117so will take effect even before AnyEvent has initialised itself.
2118
2119Note that specifying this environment variable causes the L<AnyEvent::Log>
2120module to be loaded, while C<PERL_ANYEVENT_VERBOSE> does not, so only
2121using the latter saves a few hundred kB of memory unless a module
2122explicitly needs the extra features of AnyEvent::Log.
2123
2124=item C<PERL_ANYEVENT_STRICT>
2125
2126AnyEvent does not do much argument checking by default, as thorough
2127argument checking is very costly. Setting this variable to a true value
2128will cause AnyEvent to load C<AnyEvent::Strict> and then to thoroughly
2129check the arguments passed to most method calls. If it finds any problems,
2130it will croak.
2131
2132In other words, enables "strict" mode.
2133
2134Unlike C<use strict> (or its modern cousin, C<< use L<common::sense>
2135>>, it is definitely recommended to keep it off in production. Keeping
2136C<PERL_ANYEVENT_STRICT=1> in your environment while developing programs
2137can be very useful, however.
2138
2139=item C<PERL_ANYEVENT_DEBUG_SHELL>
2140
2141If this env variable is nonempty, then its contents will be interpreted by
2142C<AnyEvent::Socket::parse_hostport> and C<AnyEvent::Debug::shell> (after
2143replacing every occurance of C<$$> by the process pid). The shell object
2144is saved in C<$AnyEvent::Debug::SHELL>.
2145
2146This happens when the first watcher is created.
2147
2148For example, to bind a debug shell on a unix domain socket in
2149F<< /tmp/debug<pid>.sock >>, you could use this:
2150
2151 PERL_ANYEVENT_DEBUG_SHELL=/tmp/debug\$\$.sock perlprog
2152 # connect with e.g.: socat readline /tmp/debug123.sock
2153
2154Or to bind to tcp port 4545 on localhost:
2155
2156 PERL_ANYEVENT_DEBUG_SHELL=127.0.0.1:4545 perlprog
2157 # connect with e.g.: telnet localhost 4545
2158
2159Note that creating sockets in F</tmp> or on localhost is very unsafe on
2160multiuser systems.
2161
2162=item C<PERL_ANYEVENT_DEBUG_WRAP>
2163
2164Can be set to C<0>, C<1> or C<2> and enables wrapping of all watchers for
2165debugging purposes. See C<AnyEvent::Debug::wrap> for details.
2166
2167=item C<PERL_ANYEVENT_MODEL>
2168
2169This can be used to specify the event model to be used by AnyEvent, before
2170auto detection and -probing kicks in.
2171
2172It normally is a string consisting entirely of ASCII letters (e.g. C<EV>
2173or C<IOAsync>). The string C<AnyEvent::Impl::> gets prepended and the
2174resulting module name is loaded and - if the load was successful - used as
2175event model backend. If it fails to load then AnyEvent will proceed with
2176auto detection and -probing.
2177
2178If the string ends with C<::> instead (e.g. C<AnyEvent::Impl::EV::>) then
2179nothing gets prepended and the module name is used as-is (hint: C<::> at
2180the end of a string designates a module name and quotes it appropriately).
2181
2182For example, to force the pure perl model (L<AnyEvent::Loop::Perl>) you
2183could start your program like this:
2184
2185 PERL_ANYEVENT_MODEL=Perl perl ...
2186
2187=item C<PERL_ANYEVENT_IO_MODEL>
2188
2189The current file I/O model - see L<AnyEvent::IO> for more info.
2190
2191At the moment, only C<Perl> (small, pure-perl, synchronous) and
2192C<IOAIO> (truly asynchronous) are supported. The default is C<IOAIO> if
2193L<AnyEvent::AIO> can be loaded, otherwise it is C<Perl>.
2194
2195=item C<PERL_ANYEVENT_PROTOCOLS>
2196
2197Used by both L<AnyEvent::DNS> and L<AnyEvent::Socket> to determine preferences
2198for IPv4 or IPv6. The default is unspecified (and might change, or be the result
2199of auto probing).
2200
2201Must be set to a comma-separated list of protocols or address families,
2202current supported: C<ipv4> and C<ipv6>. Only protocols mentioned will be
2203used, and preference will be given to protocols mentioned earlier in the
2204list.
2205
2206This variable can effectively be used for denial-of-service attacks
2207against local programs (e.g. when setuid), although the impact is likely
2208small, as the program has to handle conenction and other failures anyways.
2209
2210Examples: C<PERL_ANYEVENT_PROTOCOLS=ipv4,ipv6> - prefer IPv4 over IPv6,
2211but support both and try to use both. C<PERL_ANYEVENT_PROTOCOLS=ipv4>
2212- only support IPv4, never try to resolve or contact IPv6
2213addresses. C<PERL_ANYEVENT_PROTOCOLS=ipv6,ipv4> support either IPv4 or
2214IPv6, but prefer IPv6 over IPv4.
2215
2216=item C<PERL_ANYEVENT_HOSTS>
2217
2218This variable, if specified, overrides the F</etc/hosts> file used by
2219L<AnyEvent::Socket>C<::resolve_sockaddr>, i.e. hosts aliases will be read
2220from that file instead.
2221
2222=item C<PERL_ANYEVENT_EDNS0>
2223
2224Used by L<AnyEvent::DNS> to decide whether to use the EDNS0 extension for
2225DNS. This extension is generally useful to reduce DNS traffic, especially
2226when DNSSEC is involved, but some (broken) firewalls drop such DNS
2227packets, which is why it is off by default.
2228
2229Setting this variable to C<1> will cause L<AnyEvent::DNS> to announce
2230EDNS0 in its DNS requests.
2231
2232=item C<PERL_ANYEVENT_MAX_FORKS>
2233
2234The maximum number of child processes that C<AnyEvent::Util::fork_call>
2235will create in parallel.
2236
2237=item C<PERL_ANYEVENT_MAX_OUTSTANDING_DNS>
2238
2239The default value for the C<max_outstanding> parameter for the default DNS
2240resolver - this is the maximum number of parallel DNS requests that are
2241sent to the DNS server.
2242
2243=item C<PERL_ANYEVENT_MAX_SIGNAL_LATENCY>
2244
2245Perl has inherently racy signal handling (you can basically choose between
2246losing signals and memory corruption) - pure perl event loops (including
2247C<AnyEvent::Loop>, when C<Async::Interrupt> isn't available) therefore
2248have to poll regularly to avoid losing signals.
2249
2250Some event loops are racy, but don't poll regularly, and some event loops
2251are written in C but are still racy. For those event loops, AnyEvent
2252installs a timer that regularly wakes up the event loop.
2253
2254By default, the interval for this timer is C<10> seconds, but you can
2255override this delay with this environment variable (or by setting
2256the C<$AnyEvent::MAX_SIGNAL_LATENCY> variable before creating signal
2257watchers).
2258
2259Lower values increase CPU (and energy) usage, higher values can introduce
2260long delays when reaping children or waiting for signals.
2261
2262The L<AnyEvent::Async> module, if available, will be used to avoid this
2263polling (with most event loops).
2264
2265=item C<PERL_ANYEVENT_RESOLV_CONF>
2266
2267The absolute path to a F<resolv.conf>-style file to use instead of
2268F</etc/resolv.conf> (or the OS-specific configuration) in the default
2269resolver, or the empty string to select the default configuration.
2270
2271=item C<PERL_ANYEVENT_CA_FILE>, C<PERL_ANYEVENT_CA_PATH>.
2272
2273When neither C<ca_file> nor C<ca_path> was specified during
2274L<AnyEvent::TLS> context creation, and either of these environment
2275variables are nonempty, they will be used to specify CA certificate
2276locations instead of a system-dependent default.
2277
2278=item C<PERL_ANYEVENT_AVOID_GUARD> and C<PERL_ANYEVENT_AVOID_ASYNC_INTERRUPT>
2279
2280When these are set to C<1>, then the respective modules are not
2281loaded. Mostly good for testing AnyEvent itself.
2282
2283=back
487 2284
488=head1 SUPPLYING YOUR OWN EVENT MODEL INTERFACE 2285=head1 SUPPLYING YOUR OWN EVENT MODEL INTERFACE
2286
2287This is an advanced topic that you do not normally need to use AnyEvent in
2288a module. This section is only of use to event loop authors who want to
2289provide AnyEvent compatibility.
489 2290
490If you need to support another event library which isn't directly 2291If you need to support another event library which isn't directly
491supported by AnyEvent, you can supply your own interface to it by 2292supported by AnyEvent, you can supply your own interface to it by
492pushing, before the first watcher gets created, the package name of 2293pushing, before the first watcher gets created, the package name of
493the event module and the package name of the interface to use onto 2294the event module and the package name of the interface to use onto
494C<@AnyEvent::REGISTRY>. You can do that before and even without loading 2295C<@AnyEvent::REGISTRY>. You can do that before and even without loading
495AnyEvent. 2296AnyEvent, so it is reasonably cheap.
496 2297
497Example: 2298Example:
498 2299
499 push @AnyEvent::REGISTRY, [urxvt => urxvt::anyevent::]; 2300 push @AnyEvent::REGISTRY, [urxvt => urxvt::anyevent::];
500 2301
501This tells AnyEvent to (literally) use the C<urxvt::anyevent::> 2302This tells AnyEvent to (literally) use the C<urxvt::anyevent::>
502package/class when it finds the C<urxvt> package/module is loaded. When 2303package/class when it finds the C<urxvt> package/module is already loaded.
2304
503AnyEvent is loaded and asked to find a suitable event model, it will 2305When AnyEvent is loaded and asked to find a suitable event model, it
504first check for the presence of urxvt. 2306will first check for the presence of urxvt by trying to C<use> the
2307C<urxvt::anyevent> module.
505 2308
506The class should provide implementations for all watcher types (see 2309The class should provide implementations for all watcher types. See
507L<AnyEvent::Impl::Event> (source code), L<AnyEvent::Impl::Glib> 2310L<AnyEvent::Impl::EV> (source code), L<AnyEvent::Impl::Glib> (Source code)
508(Source code) and so on for actual examples, use C<perldoc -m 2311and so on for actual examples. Use C<perldoc -m AnyEvent::Impl::Glib> to
509AnyEvent::Impl::Glib> to see the sources). 2312see the sources.
510 2313
2314If you don't provide C<signal> and C<child> watchers than AnyEvent will
2315provide suitable (hopefully) replacements.
2316
511The above isn't fictitious, the I<rxvt-unicode> (a.k.a. urxvt) 2317The above example isn't fictitious, the I<rxvt-unicode> (a.k.a. urxvt)
512uses the above line as-is. An interface isn't included in AnyEvent 2318terminal emulator uses the above line as-is. An interface isn't included
513because it doesn't make sense outside the embedded interpreter inside 2319in AnyEvent because it doesn't make sense outside the embedded interpreter
514I<rxvt-unicode>, and it is updated and maintained as part of the 2320inside I<rxvt-unicode>, and it is updated and maintained as part of the
515I<rxvt-unicode> distribution. 2321I<rxvt-unicode> distribution.
516 2322
517I<rxvt-unicode> also cheats a bit by not providing blocking access to 2323I<rxvt-unicode> also cheats a bit by not providing blocking access to
518condition variables: code blocking while waiting for a condition will 2324condition variables: code blocking while waiting for a condition will
519C<die>. This still works with most modules/usages, and blocking calls must 2325C<die>. This still works with most modules/usages, and blocking calls must
520not be in an interactive application, so it makes sense. 2326not be done in an interactive application, so it makes sense.
521 2327
522=head1 ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
523
524The following environment variables are used by this module:
525
526C<PERL_ANYEVENT_VERBOSE> when set to C<2> or higher, reports which event
527model gets used.
528
529=head1 EXAMPLE 2328=head1 EXAMPLE PROGRAM
530 2329
531The following program uses an io watcher to read data from stdin, a timer 2330The following program uses an I/O watcher to read data from STDIN, a timer
532to display a message once per second, and a condvar to exit the program 2331to display a message once per second, and a condition variable to quit the
533when the user enters quit: 2332program when the user enters quit:
534 2333
535 use AnyEvent; 2334 use AnyEvent;
536 2335
537 my $cv = AnyEvent->condvar; 2336 my $cv = AnyEvent->condvar;
538 2337
539 my $io_watcher = AnyEvent->io (fh => \*STDIN, poll => 'r', cb => sub { 2338 my $io_watcher = AnyEvent->io (
2339 fh => \*STDIN,
2340 poll => 'r',
2341 cb => sub {
540 warn "io event <$_[0]>\n"; # will always output <r> 2342 warn "io event <$_[0]>\n"; # will always output <r>
541 chomp (my $input = <STDIN>); # read a line 2343 chomp (my $input = <STDIN>); # read a line
542 warn "read: $input\n"; # output what has been read 2344 warn "read: $input\n"; # output what has been read
543 $cv->broadcast if $input =~ /^q/i; # quit program if /^q/i 2345 $cv->send if $input =~ /^q/i; # quit program if /^q/i
2346 },
2347 );
2348
2349 my $time_watcher = AnyEvent->timer (after => 1, interval => 1, cb => sub {
2350 warn "timeout\n"; # print 'timeout' at most every second
544 }); 2351 });
545 2352
546 my $time_watcher; # can only be used once
547
548 sub new_timer {
549 $timer = AnyEvent->timer (after => 1, cb => sub {
550 warn "timeout\n"; # print 'timeout' about every second
551 &new_timer; # and restart the time
552 });
553 }
554
555 new_timer; # create first timer
556
557 $cv->wait; # wait until user enters /^q/i 2353 $cv->recv; # wait until user enters /^q/i
558 2354
559=head1 REAL-WORLD EXAMPLE 2355=head1 REAL-WORLD EXAMPLE
560 2356
561Consider the L<Net::FCP> module. It features (among others) the following 2357Consider the L<Net::FCP> module. It features (among others) the following
562API calls, which are to freenet what HTTP GET requests are to http: 2358API calls, which are to freenet what HTTP GET requests are to http:
612 syswrite $txn->{fh}, $txn->{request} 2408 syswrite $txn->{fh}, $txn->{request}
613 or die "connection or write error"; 2409 or die "connection or write error";
614 $txn->{w} = AnyEvent->io (fh => $txn->{fh}, poll => 'r', cb => sub { $txn->fh_ready_r }); 2410 $txn->{w} = AnyEvent->io (fh => $txn->{fh}, poll => 'r', cb => sub { $txn->fh_ready_r });
615 2411
616Again, C<fh_ready_r> waits till all data has arrived, and then stores the 2412Again, C<fh_ready_r> waits till all data has arrived, and then stores the
617result and signals any possible waiters that the request ahs finished: 2413result and signals any possible waiters that the request has finished:
618 2414
619 sysread $txn->{fh}, $txn->{buf}, length $txn->{$buf}; 2415 sysread $txn->{fh}, $txn->{buf}, length $txn->{$buf};
620 2416
621 if (end-of-file or data complete) { 2417 if (end-of-file or data complete) {
622 $txn->{result} = $txn->{buf}; 2418 $txn->{result} = $txn->{buf};
623 $txn->{finished}->broadcast; 2419 $txn->{finished}->send;
624 $txb->{cb}->($txn) of $txn->{cb}; # also call callback 2420 $txb->{cb}->($txn) of $txn->{cb}; # also call callback
625 } 2421 }
626 2422
627The C<result> method, finally, just waits for the finished signal (if the 2423The C<result> method, finally, just waits for the finished signal (if the
628request was already finished, it doesn't wait, of course, and returns the 2424request was already finished, it doesn't wait, of course, and returns the
629data: 2425data:
630 2426
631 $txn->{finished}->wait; 2427 $txn->{finished}->recv;
632 return $txn->{result}; 2428 return $txn->{result};
633 2429
634The actual code goes further and collects all errors (C<die>s, exceptions) 2430The actual code goes further and collects all errors (C<die>s, exceptions)
635that occured during request processing. The C<result> method detects 2431that occurred during request processing. The C<result> method detects
636wether an exception as thrown (it is stored inside the $txn object) 2432whether an exception as thrown (it is stored inside the $txn object)
637and just throws the exception, which means connection errors and other 2433and just throws the exception, which means connection errors and other
638problems get reported tot he code that tries to use the result, not in a 2434problems get reported to the code that tries to use the result, not in a
639random callback. 2435random callback.
640 2436
641All of this enables the following usage styles: 2437All of this enables the following usage styles:
642 2438
6431. Blocking: 24391. Blocking:
644 2440
645 my $data = $fcp->client_get ($url); 2441 my $data = $fcp->client_get ($url);
646 2442
6472. Blocking, but parallelizing: 24432. Blocking, but running in parallel:
648 2444
649 my @datas = map $_->result, 2445 my @datas = map $_->result,
650 map $fcp->txn_client_get ($_), 2446 map $fcp->txn_client_get ($_),
651 @urls; 2447 @urls;
652 2448
653Both blocking examples work without the module user having to know 2449Both blocking examples work without the module user having to know
654anything about events. 2450anything about events.
655 2451
6563a. Event-based in a main program, using any support Event module: 24523a. Event-based in a main program, using any supported event module:
657 2453
658 use Event; 2454 use EV;
659 2455
660 $fcp->txn_client_get ($url)->cb (sub { 2456 $fcp->txn_client_get ($url)->cb (sub {
661 my $txn = shift; 2457 my $txn = shift;
662 my $data = $txn->result; 2458 my $data = $txn->result;
663 ... 2459 ...
664 }); 2460 });
665 2461
666 Event::loop; 2462 EV::loop;
667 2463
6683b. The module user could use AnyEvent, too: 24643b. The module user could use AnyEvent, too:
669 2465
670 use AnyEvent; 2466 use AnyEvent;
671 2467
672 my $quit = AnyEvent->condvar; 2468 my $quit = AnyEvent->condvar;
673 2469
674 $fcp->txn_client_get ($url)->cb (sub { 2470 $fcp->txn_client_get ($url)->cb (sub {
675 ... 2471 ...
676 $quit->broadcast; 2472 $quit->send;
677 }); 2473 });
678 2474
679 $quit->wait; 2475 $quit->recv;
2476
2477
2478=head1 BENCHMARKS
2479
2480To give you an idea of the performance and overheads that AnyEvent adds
2481over the event loops themselves and to give you an impression of the speed
2482of various event loops I prepared some benchmarks.
2483
2484=head2 BENCHMARKING ANYEVENT OVERHEAD
2485
2486Here is a benchmark of various supported event models used natively and
2487through AnyEvent. The benchmark creates a lot of timers (with a zero
2488timeout) and I/O watchers (watching STDOUT, a pty, to become writable,
2489which it is), lets them fire exactly once and destroys them again.
2490
2491Source code for this benchmark is found as F<eg/bench> in the AnyEvent
2492distribution. It uses the L<AE> interface, which makes a real difference
2493for the EV and Perl backends only.
2494
2495=head3 Explanation of the columns
2496
2497I<watcher> is the number of event watchers created/destroyed. Since
2498different event models feature vastly different performances, each event
2499loop was given a number of watchers so that overall runtime is acceptable
2500and similar between tested event loop (and keep them from crashing): Glib
2501would probably take thousands of years if asked to process the same number
2502of watchers as EV in this benchmark.
2503
2504I<bytes> is the number of bytes (as measured by the resident set size,
2505RSS) consumed by each watcher. This method of measuring captures both C
2506and Perl-based overheads.
2507
2508I<create> is the time, in microseconds (millionths of seconds), that it
2509takes to create a single watcher. The callback is a closure shared between
2510all watchers, to avoid adding memory overhead. That means closure creation
2511and memory usage is not included in the figures.
2512
2513I<invoke> is the time, in microseconds, used to invoke a simple
2514callback. The callback simply counts down a Perl variable and after it was
2515invoked "watcher" times, it would C<< ->send >> a condvar once to
2516signal the end of this phase.
2517
2518I<destroy> is the time, in microseconds, that it takes to destroy a single
2519watcher.
2520
2521=head3 Results
2522
2523 name watchers bytes create invoke destroy comment
2524 EV/EV 100000 223 0.47 0.43 0.27 EV native interface
2525 EV/Any 100000 223 0.48 0.42 0.26 EV + AnyEvent watchers
2526 Coro::EV/Any 100000 223 0.47 0.42 0.26 coroutines + Coro::Signal
2527 Perl/Any 100000 431 2.70 0.74 0.92 pure perl implementation
2528 Event/Event 16000 516 31.16 31.84 0.82 Event native interface
2529 Event/Any 16000 1203 42.61 34.79 1.80 Event + AnyEvent watchers
2530 IOAsync/Any 16000 1911 41.92 27.45 16.81 via IO::Async::Loop::IO_Poll
2531 IOAsync/Any 16000 1726 40.69 26.37 15.25 via IO::Async::Loop::Epoll
2532 Glib/Any 16000 1118 89.00 12.57 51.17 quadratic behaviour
2533 Tk/Any 2000 1346 20.96 10.75 8.00 SEGV with >> 2000 watchers
2534 POE/Any 2000 6951 108.97 795.32 14.24 via POE::Loop::Event
2535 POE/Any 2000 6648 94.79 774.40 575.51 via POE::Loop::Select
2536
2537=head3 Discussion
2538
2539The benchmark does I<not> measure scalability of the event loop very
2540well. For example, a select-based event loop (such as the pure perl one)
2541can never compete with an event loop that uses epoll when the number of
2542file descriptors grows high. In this benchmark, all events become ready at
2543the same time, so select/poll-based implementations get an unnatural speed
2544boost.
2545
2546Also, note that the number of watchers usually has a nonlinear effect on
2547overall speed, that is, creating twice as many watchers doesn't take twice
2548the time - usually it takes longer. This puts event loops tested with a
2549higher number of watchers at a disadvantage.
2550
2551To put the range of results into perspective, consider that on the
2552benchmark machine, handling an event takes roughly 1600 CPU cycles with
2553EV, 3100 CPU cycles with AnyEvent's pure perl loop and almost 3000000 CPU
2554cycles with POE.
2555
2556C<EV> is the sole leader regarding speed and memory use, which are both
2557maximal/minimal, respectively. When using the L<AE> API there is zero
2558overhead (when going through the AnyEvent API create is about 5-6 times
2559slower, with other times being equal, so still uses far less memory than
2560any other event loop and is still faster than Event natively).
2561
2562The pure perl implementation is hit in a few sweet spots (both the
2563constant timeout and the use of a single fd hit optimisations in the perl
2564interpreter and the backend itself). Nevertheless this shows that it
2565adds very little overhead in itself. Like any select-based backend its
2566performance becomes really bad with lots of file descriptors (and few of
2567them active), of course, but this was not subject of this benchmark.
2568
2569The C<Event> module has a relatively high setup and callback invocation
2570cost, but overall scores in on the third place.
2571
2572C<IO::Async> performs admirably well, about on par with C<Event>, even
2573when using its pure perl backend.
2574
2575C<Glib>'s memory usage is quite a bit higher, but it features a
2576faster callback invocation and overall ends up in the same class as
2577C<Event>. However, Glib scales extremely badly, doubling the number of
2578watchers increases the processing time by more than a factor of four,
2579making it completely unusable when using larger numbers of watchers
2580(note that only a single file descriptor was used in the benchmark, so
2581inefficiencies of C<poll> do not account for this).
2582
2583The C<Tk> adaptor works relatively well. The fact that it crashes with
2584more than 2000 watchers is a big setback, however, as correctness takes
2585precedence over speed. Nevertheless, its performance is surprising, as the
2586file descriptor is dup()ed for each watcher. This shows that the dup()
2587employed by some adaptors is not a big performance issue (it does incur a
2588hidden memory cost inside the kernel which is not reflected in the figures
2589above).
2590
2591C<POE>, regardless of underlying event loop (whether using its pure perl
2592select-based backend or the Event module, the POE-EV backend couldn't
2593be tested because it wasn't working) shows abysmal performance and
2594memory usage with AnyEvent: Watchers use almost 30 times as much memory
2595as EV watchers, and 10 times as much memory as Event (the high memory
2596requirements are caused by requiring a session for each watcher). Watcher
2597invocation speed is almost 900 times slower than with AnyEvent's pure perl
2598implementation.
2599
2600The design of the POE adaptor class in AnyEvent can not really account
2601for the performance issues, though, as session creation overhead is
2602small compared to execution of the state machine, which is coded pretty
2603optimally within L<AnyEvent::Impl::POE> (and while everybody agrees that
2604using multiple sessions is not a good approach, especially regarding
2605memory usage, even the author of POE could not come up with a faster
2606design).
2607
2608=head3 Summary
2609
2610=over 4
2611
2612=item * Using EV through AnyEvent is faster than any other event loop
2613(even when used without AnyEvent), but most event loops have acceptable
2614performance with or without AnyEvent.
2615
2616=item * The overhead AnyEvent adds is usually much smaller than the overhead of
2617the actual event loop, only with extremely fast event loops such as EV
2618does AnyEvent add significant overhead.
2619
2620=item * You should avoid POE like the plague if you want performance or
2621reasonable memory usage.
2622
2623=back
2624
2625=head2 BENCHMARKING THE LARGE SERVER CASE
2626
2627This benchmark actually benchmarks the event loop itself. It works by
2628creating a number of "servers": each server consists of a socket pair, a
2629timeout watcher that gets reset on activity (but never fires), and an I/O
2630watcher waiting for input on one side of the socket. Each time the socket
2631watcher reads a byte it will write that byte to a random other "server".
2632
2633The effect is that there will be a lot of I/O watchers, only part of which
2634are active at any one point (so there is a constant number of active
2635fds for each loop iteration, but which fds these are is random). The
2636timeout is reset each time something is read because that reflects how
2637most timeouts work (and puts extra pressure on the event loops).
2638
2639In this benchmark, we use 10000 socket pairs (20000 sockets), of which 100
2640(1%) are active. This mirrors the activity of large servers with many
2641connections, most of which are idle at any one point in time.
2642
2643Source code for this benchmark is found as F<eg/bench2> in the AnyEvent
2644distribution. It uses the L<AE> interface, which makes a real difference
2645for the EV and Perl backends only.
2646
2647=head3 Explanation of the columns
2648
2649I<sockets> is the number of sockets, and twice the number of "servers" (as
2650each server has a read and write socket end).
2651
2652I<create> is the time it takes to create a socket pair (which is
2653nontrivial) and two watchers: an I/O watcher and a timeout watcher.
2654
2655I<request>, the most important value, is the time it takes to handle a
2656single "request", that is, reading the token from the pipe and forwarding
2657it to another server. This includes deleting the old timeout and creating
2658a new one that moves the timeout into the future.
2659
2660=head3 Results
2661
2662 name sockets create request
2663 EV 20000 62.66 7.99
2664 Perl 20000 68.32 32.64
2665 IOAsync 20000 174.06 101.15 epoll
2666 IOAsync 20000 174.67 610.84 poll
2667 Event 20000 202.69 242.91
2668 Glib 20000 557.01 1689.52
2669 POE 20000 341.54 12086.32 uses POE::Loop::Event
2670
2671=head3 Discussion
2672
2673This benchmark I<does> measure scalability and overall performance of the
2674particular event loop.
2675
2676EV is again fastest. Since it is using epoll on my system, the setup time
2677is relatively high, though.
2678
2679Perl surprisingly comes second. It is much faster than the C-based event
2680loops Event and Glib.
2681
2682IO::Async performs very well when using its epoll backend, and still quite
2683good compared to Glib when using its pure perl backend.
2684
2685Event suffers from high setup time as well (look at its code and you will
2686understand why). Callback invocation also has a high overhead compared to
2687the C<< $_->() for .. >>-style loop that the Perl event loop uses. Event
2688uses select or poll in basically all documented configurations.
2689
2690Glib is hit hard by its quadratic behaviour w.r.t. many watchers. It
2691clearly fails to perform with many filehandles or in busy servers.
2692
2693POE is still completely out of the picture, taking over 1000 times as long
2694as EV, and over 100 times as long as the Perl implementation, even though
2695it uses a C-based event loop in this case.
2696
2697=head3 Summary
2698
2699=over 4
2700
2701=item * The pure perl implementation performs extremely well.
2702
2703=item * Avoid Glib or POE in large projects where performance matters.
2704
2705=back
2706
2707=head2 BENCHMARKING SMALL SERVERS
2708
2709While event loops should scale (and select-based ones do not...) even to
2710large servers, most programs we (or I :) actually write have only a few
2711I/O watchers.
2712
2713In this benchmark, I use the same benchmark program as in the large server
2714case, but it uses only eight "servers", of which three are active at any
2715one time. This should reflect performance for a small server relatively
2716well.
2717
2718The columns are identical to the previous table.
2719
2720=head3 Results
2721
2722 name sockets create request
2723 EV 16 20.00 6.54
2724 Perl 16 25.75 12.62
2725 Event 16 81.27 35.86
2726 Glib 16 32.63 15.48
2727 POE 16 261.87 276.28 uses POE::Loop::Event
2728
2729=head3 Discussion
2730
2731The benchmark tries to test the performance of a typical small
2732server. While knowing how various event loops perform is interesting, keep
2733in mind that their overhead in this case is usually not as important, due
2734to the small absolute number of watchers (that is, you need efficiency and
2735speed most when you have lots of watchers, not when you only have a few of
2736them).
2737
2738EV is again fastest.
2739
2740Perl again comes second. It is noticeably faster than the C-based event
2741loops Event and Glib, although the difference is too small to really
2742matter.
2743
2744POE also performs much better in this case, but is is still far behind the
2745others.
2746
2747=head3 Summary
2748
2749=over 4
2750
2751=item * C-based event loops perform very well with small number of
2752watchers, as the management overhead dominates.
2753
2754=back
2755
2756=head2 THE IO::Lambda BENCHMARK
2757
2758Recently I was told about the benchmark in the IO::Lambda manpage, which
2759could be misinterpreted to make AnyEvent look bad. In fact, the benchmark
2760simply compares IO::Lambda with POE, and IO::Lambda looks better (which
2761shouldn't come as a surprise to anybody). As such, the benchmark is
2762fine, and mostly shows that the AnyEvent backend from IO::Lambda isn't
2763very optimal. But how would AnyEvent compare when used without the extra
2764baggage? To explore this, I wrote the equivalent benchmark for AnyEvent.
2765
2766The benchmark itself creates an echo-server, and then, for 500 times,
2767connects to the echo server, sends a line, waits for the reply, and then
2768creates the next connection. This is a rather bad benchmark, as it doesn't
2769test the efficiency of the framework or much non-blocking I/O, but it is a
2770benchmark nevertheless.
2771
2772 name runtime
2773 Lambda/select 0.330 sec
2774 + optimized 0.122 sec
2775 Lambda/AnyEvent 0.327 sec
2776 + optimized 0.138 sec
2777 Raw sockets/select 0.077 sec
2778 POE/select, components 0.662 sec
2779 POE/select, raw sockets 0.226 sec
2780 POE/select, optimized 0.404 sec
2781
2782 AnyEvent/select/nb 0.085 sec
2783 AnyEvent/EV/nb 0.068 sec
2784 +state machine 0.134 sec
2785
2786The benchmark is also a bit unfair (my fault): the IO::Lambda/POE
2787benchmarks actually make blocking connects and use 100% blocking I/O,
2788defeating the purpose of an event-based solution. All of the newly
2789written AnyEvent benchmarks use 100% non-blocking connects (using
2790AnyEvent::Socket::tcp_connect and the asynchronous pure perl DNS
2791resolver), so AnyEvent is at a disadvantage here, as non-blocking connects
2792generally require a lot more bookkeeping and event handling than blocking
2793connects (which involve a single syscall only).
2794
2795The last AnyEvent benchmark additionally uses L<AnyEvent::Handle>, which
2796offers similar expressive power as POE and IO::Lambda, using conventional
2797Perl syntax. This means that both the echo server and the client are 100%
2798non-blocking, further placing it at a disadvantage.
2799
2800As you can see, the AnyEvent + EV combination even beats the
2801hand-optimised "raw sockets benchmark", while AnyEvent + its pure perl
2802backend easily beats IO::Lambda and POE.
2803
2804And even the 100% non-blocking version written using the high-level (and
2805slow :) L<AnyEvent::Handle> abstraction beats both POE and IO::Lambda
2806higher level ("unoptimised") abstractions by a large margin, even though
2807it does all of DNS, tcp-connect and socket I/O in a non-blocking way.
2808
2809The two AnyEvent benchmarks programs can be found as F<eg/ae0.pl> and
2810F<eg/ae2.pl> in the AnyEvent distribution, the remaining benchmarks are
2811part of the IO::Lambda distribution and were used without any changes.
2812
2813
2814=head1 SIGNALS
2815
2816AnyEvent currently installs handlers for these signals:
2817
2818=over 4
2819
2820=item SIGCHLD
2821
2822A handler for C<SIGCHLD> is installed by AnyEvent's child watcher
2823emulation for event loops that do not support them natively. Also, some
2824event loops install a similar handler.
2825
2826Additionally, when AnyEvent is loaded and SIGCHLD is set to IGNORE, then
2827AnyEvent will reset it to default, to avoid losing child exit statuses.
2828
2829=item SIGPIPE
2830
2831A no-op handler is installed for C<SIGPIPE> when C<$SIG{PIPE}> is C<undef>
2832when AnyEvent gets loaded.
2833
2834The rationale for this is that AnyEvent users usually do not really depend
2835on SIGPIPE delivery (which is purely an optimisation for shell use, or
2836badly-written programs), but C<SIGPIPE> can cause spurious and rare
2837program exits as a lot of people do not expect C<SIGPIPE> when writing to
2838some random socket.
2839
2840The rationale for installing a no-op handler as opposed to ignoring it is
2841that this way, the handler will be restored to defaults on exec.
2842
2843Feel free to install your own handler, or reset it to defaults.
2844
2845=back
2846
2847=cut
2848
2849undef $SIG{CHLD}
2850 if $SIG{CHLD} eq 'IGNORE';
2851
2852$SIG{PIPE} = sub { }
2853 unless defined $SIG{PIPE};
2854
2855=head1 RECOMMENDED/OPTIONAL MODULES
2856
2857One of AnyEvent's main goals is to be 100% Pure-Perl(tm): only perl (and
2858its built-in modules) are required to use it.
2859
2860That does not mean that AnyEvent won't take advantage of some additional
2861modules if they are installed.
2862
2863This section explains which additional modules will be used, and how they
2864affect AnyEvent's operation.
2865
2866=over 4
2867
2868=item L<Async::Interrupt>
2869
2870This slightly arcane module is used to implement fast signal handling: To
2871my knowledge, there is no way to do completely race-free and quick
2872signal handling in pure perl. To ensure that signals still get
2873delivered, AnyEvent will start an interval timer to wake up perl (and
2874catch the signals) with some delay (default is 10 seconds, look for
2875C<$AnyEvent::MAX_SIGNAL_LATENCY>).
2876
2877If this module is available, then it will be used to implement signal
2878catching, which means that signals will not be delayed, and the event loop
2879will not be interrupted regularly, which is more efficient (and good for
2880battery life on laptops).
2881
2882This affects not just the pure-perl event loop, but also other event loops
2883that have no signal handling on their own (e.g. Glib, Tk, Qt).
2884
2885Some event loops (POE, Event, Event::Lib) offer signal watchers natively,
2886and either employ their own workarounds (POE) or use AnyEvent's workaround
2887(using C<$AnyEvent::MAX_SIGNAL_LATENCY>). Installing L<Async::Interrupt>
2888does nothing for those backends.
2889
2890=item L<EV>
2891
2892This module isn't really "optional", as it is simply one of the backend
2893event loops that AnyEvent can use. However, it is simply the best event
2894loop available in terms of features, speed and stability: It supports
2895the AnyEvent API optimally, implements all the watcher types in XS, does
2896automatic timer adjustments even when no monotonic clock is available,
2897can take avdantage of advanced kernel interfaces such as C<epoll> and
2898C<kqueue>, and is the fastest backend I<by far>. You can even embed
2899L<Glib>/L<Gtk2> in it (or vice versa, see L<EV::Glib> and L<Glib::EV>).
2900
2901If you only use backends that rely on another event loop (e.g. C<Tk>),
2902then this module will do nothing for you.
2903
2904=item L<Guard>
2905
2906The guard module, when used, will be used to implement
2907C<AnyEvent::Util::guard>. This speeds up guards considerably (and uses a
2908lot less memory), but otherwise doesn't affect guard operation much. It is
2909purely used for performance.
2910
2911=item L<JSON> and L<JSON::XS>
2912
2913One of these modules is required when you want to read or write JSON data
2914via L<AnyEvent::Handle>. L<JSON> is also written in pure-perl, but can take
2915advantage of the ultra-high-speed L<JSON::XS> module when it is installed.
2916
2917=item L<Net::SSLeay>
2918
2919Implementing TLS/SSL in Perl is certainly interesting, but not very
2920worthwhile: If this module is installed, then L<AnyEvent::Handle> (with
2921the help of L<AnyEvent::TLS>), gains the ability to do TLS/SSL.
2922
2923=item L<Time::HiRes>
2924
2925This module is part of perl since release 5.008. It will be used when the
2926chosen event library does not come with a timing source of its own. The
2927pure-perl event loop (L<AnyEvent::Loop>) will additionally load it to
2928try to use a monotonic clock for timing stability.
2929
2930=back
2931
2932
2933=head1 FORK
2934
2935Most event libraries are not fork-safe. The ones who are usually are
2936because they rely on inefficient but fork-safe C<select> or C<poll> calls
2937- higher performance APIs such as BSD's kqueue or the dreaded Linux epoll
2938are usually badly thought-out hacks that are incompatible with fork in
2939one way or another. Only L<EV> is fully fork-aware and ensures that you
2940continue event-processing in both parent and child (or both, if you know
2941what you are doing).
2942
2943This means that, in general, you cannot fork and do event processing in
2944the child if the event library was initialised before the fork (which
2945usually happens when the first AnyEvent watcher is created, or the library
2946is loaded).
2947
2948If you have to fork, you must either do so I<before> creating your first
2949watcher OR you must not use AnyEvent at all in the child OR you must do
2950something completely out of the scope of AnyEvent.
2951
2952The problem of doing event processing in the parent I<and> the child
2953is much more complicated: even for backends that I<are> fork-aware or
2954fork-safe, their behaviour is not usually what you want: fork clones all
2955watchers, that means all timers, I/O watchers etc. are active in both
2956parent and child, which is almost never what you want. USing C<exec>
2957to start worker children from some kind of manage rprocess is usually
2958preferred, because it is much easier and cleaner, at the expense of having
2959to have another binary.
2960
2961
2962=head1 SECURITY CONSIDERATIONS
2963
2964AnyEvent can be forced to load any event model via
2965$ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_MODEL}. While this cannot (to my knowledge) be used to
2966execute arbitrary code or directly gain access, it can easily be used to
2967make the program hang or malfunction in subtle ways, as AnyEvent watchers
2968will not be active when the program uses a different event model than
2969specified in the variable.
2970
2971You can make AnyEvent completely ignore this variable by deleting it
2972before the first watcher gets created, e.g. with a C<BEGIN> block:
2973
2974 BEGIN { delete $ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_MODEL} }
2975
2976 use AnyEvent;
2977
2978Similar considerations apply to $ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_VERBOSE}, as that can
2979be used to probe what backend is used and gain other information (which is
2980probably even less useful to an attacker than PERL_ANYEVENT_MODEL), and
2981$ENV{PERL_ANYEVENT_STRICT}.
2982
2983Note that AnyEvent will remove I<all> environment variables starting with
2984C<PERL_ANYEVENT_> from C<%ENV> when it is loaded while taint mode is
2985enabled.
2986
2987
2988=head1 BUGS
2989
2990Perl 5.8 has numerous memleaks that sometimes hit this module and are hard
2991to work around. If you suffer from memleaks, first upgrade to Perl 5.10
2992and check wether the leaks still show up. (Perl 5.10.0 has other annoying
2993memleaks, such as leaking on C<map> and C<grep> but it is usually not as
2994pronounced).
2995
680 2996
681=head1 SEE ALSO 2997=head1 SEE ALSO
682 2998
683Event modules: L<Coro::Event>, L<Coro>, L<Event>, L<Glib::Event>, L<Glib>. 2999Tutorial/Introduction: L<AnyEvent::Intro>.
684 3000
685Implementations: L<AnyEvent::Impl::Coro>, L<AnyEvent::Impl::Event>, L<AnyEvent::Impl::Glib>, L<AnyEvent::Impl::Tk>. 3001FAQ: L<AnyEvent::FAQ>.
686 3002
687Nontrivial usage example: L<Net::FCP>. 3003Utility functions: L<AnyEvent::Util> (misc. grab-bag), L<AnyEvent::Log>
3004(simply logging).
688 3005
689=head1 3006Development/Debugging: L<AnyEvent::Strict> (stricter checking),
3007L<AnyEvent::Debug> (interactive shell, watcher tracing).
3008
3009Supported event modules: L<AnyEvent::Loop>, L<EV>, L<EV::Glib>,
3010L<Glib::EV>, L<Event>, L<Glib::Event>, L<Glib>, L<Tk>, L<Event::Lib>,
3011L<Qt>, L<POE>, L<FLTK>.
3012
3013Implementations: L<AnyEvent::Impl::EV>, L<AnyEvent::Impl::Event>,
3014L<AnyEvent::Impl::Glib>, L<AnyEvent::Impl::Tk>, L<AnyEvent::Impl::Perl>,
3015L<AnyEvent::Impl::EventLib>, L<AnyEvent::Impl::Qt>,
3016L<AnyEvent::Impl::POE>, L<AnyEvent::Impl::IOAsync>, L<Anyevent::Impl::Irssi>,
3017L<AnyEvent::Impl::FLTK>.
3018
3019Non-blocking handles, pipes, stream sockets, TCP clients and
3020servers: L<AnyEvent::Handle>, L<AnyEvent::Socket>, L<AnyEvent::TLS>.
3021
3022Asynchronous File I/O: L<AnyEvent::IO>.
3023
3024Asynchronous DNS: L<AnyEvent::DNS>.
3025
3026Thread support: L<Coro>, L<Coro::AnyEvent>, L<Coro::EV>, L<Coro::Event>.
3027
3028Nontrivial usage examples: L<AnyEvent::GPSD>, L<AnyEvent::IRC>,
3029L<AnyEvent::HTTP>.
3030
3031
3032=head1 AUTHOR
3033
3034 Marc Lehmann <schmorp@schmorp.de>
3035 http://anyevent.schmorp.de
690 3036
691=cut 3037=cut
692 3038
6931 30391
694 3040

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