On Jul 6, 2010, at 1:24 PM, Martin Lucina wrote:

> Hi all,
>
> while implementing a 0MQ architecture which needs to dynamically  
> create and
> destroy sockets during operation I ran into the current behaviour of
> zmq_close() being semantically different from the standard close()  
> system
> call.
>
> Consider a scenario where we wish to send a bunch of messages, then  
> close
> the socket:
>
> zmq_send (s, ...)
> zmq_send (s, ...)
> zmq_send (s, ...)
> zmq_close (s)
>
> The current behaviour is that zmq_close() will discard any messages  
> which
> have been queued ("sent") with zmq_send() but have not yet been  
> pushed out
> to the network. Contrast this with the behaviour of the close()  
> system call
> on a standard socket where the call means "please make this socket  
> go away,
> but finish sending any outstanding data on it asynchronously if you
> can"[1].
>
> In my opinion the proper solution is to use the same semantics as the
> close() system call, in other words, zmq_close() shall invalidate the
> socket from the caller's point of view so no further operations may be
> performed on it, but 0MQ shall send any outstanding messages in the
> background *as long as a endpoint for those messages still exists*  
> before
> destroying the socket "for real".
>
Would this be logical to implement as a new zmq_setsockopt() option?

> This would mean a second change to the API which would make  
> zmq_term() a
> blocking call, since it would need to wait until all outstanding  
> messages
> are sent. The analogous functionality for the close() system call is
> handled by the OS kernel -- obviously if the OS shuts down then data  
> will
> be lost.

And I'm looking for a way to dynamically change the number of  
concurrent user threads available for a context, so maybe it's time  
for zmq_setcontextopt()? ;-)

>
> The downside is that zmq_term() could freeze for an arbitrary amount  
> of
> time if the remote end is "stuck". For applications where this is
> undesirable it would mean adding a "KILL" flag or separate  
> zmq_term_kill()
> function which means "we don't care, really go away now".
>
> Please let me know your opinions on this change; ultimately I think  
> it's
> the right way to go especially if OS integration of 0MQ sockets is  
> (a long
> way) down the road.
>
> -mato
>
> [1] This behaviour can be changed using the SO_LINGER option, we'd  
> probably
> want to implement a similar option for 0MQ sockets.
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