the current documentation appears to be incorrect, which i believe was the source of confusion. on line 20 of the code block of the section "Actors and shared mutable state" on page http://doc.akka.io/docs/akka/2.3.11/general/jmm.html#jmm-shared-state it specifically states:

 18   // Completely safe, "self" is OK to close over
 19   // and it's an ActorRef, which is thread-safe
20 Future { expensiveCalculation() } onComplete { f => self ! f.value.get }

i opened an issue for it: https://github.com/akka/akka/issues/17805

-Michael

On 06/20/15 01:45, Roland Kuhn wrote:
Hi Frederic,

you violate the first rule of Actors: never call /any/ of their methods from outside of their context of execution. This is true for all of them, including context() and self(). While the result of calling self() can then safely be shared afterwards (an ActorRef is thread-safe), the result of context() cannot (because ActorContext is not thread-safe).

What happens in your sample is that the Actor is destroyed due to the Exception (that triggers a restart), so anything referencing the old Actor instance will see a dead entity with nulls in it (in order to minimize memory leaks in case someone does something wrong).

Regards,

Roland

19 jun 2015 kl. 02:02 skrev Frederic <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>>:

There's more... as context is also null in the Future's callback, anything using context won't work, see below for an updated example using the Akka's scheduler and dispatcher:

import akka.actor._
import scala.concurrent._
import scala.concurrent.duration._

case class Done(s: String)
case object Greet
case class Complete(p: Promise[Unit])

class Greeter extends Actor {
  import context.dispatcher
  def receive = {
    case Done(s) => println(s"Done($s) (system still running)!")
    case Complete(p) => p.success(())
    case Greet =>
      val p = Promise[Unit]()
      val saveMyself = self
      val sched = context.system.scheduler
      val disp = context.dispatcher
      p.future onComplete {
        case _ =>
          println(s"self is $self")
          println(s"self is expexted to be $saveMyself")
          // cannot use self to send a message, need to close on self
          self ! Done("Send using self")
          saveMyself ! Done("Send using saveMyself")
          // are we supposed to avoid using context here?
          println(s"context is $context") // outputs: context is null
          // is this meant to work?
// context.system.scheduler.scheduleOnce(1.millisecond, saveMyself, Done) // will fail because we can't get the scheduler as context is null try { context.system.scheduler.scheduleOnce(1.millisecond, saveMyself, Done("scheduler 1")) } catch { case e => println(e) } // The following will still fail because implicit dispatcher is context.dispatcher and context is null try { sched.scheduleOnce(1.millisecond, saveMyself, Done("scheduler 2")) } catch { case e => println(e) }
          // that will work...
sched.scheduleOnce(1.millisecond, saveMyself, Done("scheduler 3"))(disp, saveMyself)
      }
      self ! Complete(p)
throw new Exception("Messing with onComplete callback, self will be dead letters")
  }
}

object HelloAkkaScala extends App {
  val system = ActorSystem("helloakka")
  val greeter = system.actorOf(Props[Greeter], "greeter")
  greeter ! Greet
}

Program output :

Running HelloAkkaScala
self is Actor[akka://helloakka/deadLetters]
[ERROR] [06/18/2015 16:47:50.464] [helloakka-akka.actor.default-dispatcher-3] [akka://helloakka/user/greeter] Messing with onComplete callback, self will be dead letters java.lang.Exception: Messing with onComplete callback, self will be dead letters
at Greeter$anonfun$receive$1.applyOrElse(HelloAkkaScala.scala:40)
at akka.actor.Actor$class.aroundReceive(Actor.scala:467)
at Greeter.aroundReceive(HelloAkkaScala.scala:9)
at akka.actor.ActorCell.receiveMessage(ActorCell.scala:516)
at akka.actor.ActorCell.invoke(ActorCell.scala:487)
at akka.dispatch.Mailbox.processMailbox(Mailbox.scala:238)
at akka.dispatch.Mailbox.run(Mailbox.scala:220)
at akka.dispatch.ForkJoinExecutorConfigurator$AkkaForkJoinTask.exec(AbstractDispatcher.scala:397)
at scala.concurrent.forkjoin.ForkJoinTask.doExec(ForkJoinTask.java:260)
at scala.concurrent.forkjoin.ForkJoinPool$WorkQueue.runTask(ForkJoinPool.java:1339) at scala.concurrent.forkjoin.ForkJoinPool.runWorker(ForkJoinPool.java:1979) at scala.concurrent.forkjoin.ForkJoinWorkerThread.run(ForkJoinWorkerThread.java:107)

self is expexted to be Actor[akka://helloakka/user/greeter#-1327535750]
context is null
java.lang.NullPointerException
java.lang.NullPointerException
Done(Send using saveMyself) (system still running)!
[INFO] [06/18/2015 16:47:50.480] [helloakka-akka.actor.default-dispatcher-4] [akka://helloakka/deadLetters] Message [Done] from Actor[akka://helloakka/deadLetters] to Actor[akka://helloakka/deadLetters <akka://helloakka/deadLetters]%20Message%20[Done]%20from%20Actor[akka://helloakka/deadLetters]%20to%20Actor[akka://helloakka/deadLetters>] was not delivered. [1] dead letters encountered. This logging can be turned off or adjusted with configuration settings 'akka.log-dead-letters' and 'akka.log-dead-letters-during-shutdown'.
Done(scheduler 3) (system still running)!


On Thursday, June 18, 2015 at 2:37:35 PM UTC-7, Frederic wrote:

    Hello,

    I found a quite specific case involving Actors, Future callbacks
    and exceptions where self becomes deadLetters.

    I have the feeling I'm using self the way it is meant to be used,
    as described here:
    http://doc.akka.io/docs/akka/2.3.11/general/jmm.html#jmm-shared-state
    <http://doc.akka.io/docs/akka/2.3.11/general/jmm.html#jmm-shared-state>

    Am I doing something wrong or is it a bug?

    Please see code and output below to reproduce/illustrate the issue.

    Thanks, Fred

    import akka.actor._
    import scala.concurrent._

    case object Done
    case object Greet
    case class Complete(p: Promise[Unit])

    class Greeter extends Actor {
      import context.dispatcher
      def receive = {
        case Done => println("Done (system still running)!")
        case Complete(p) => p.success(())
        case Greet =>
          val p = Promise[Unit]()
          val saveMyself = self
          p.future onComplete {
            case _ =>
              println(s"self is $self")
              println(s"self is expexted to be $saveMyself")
              // cannot use self to send a message, bug?
              self ! Done
              saveMyself ! Done
          }
          self ! Complete(p)
          throw new Exception("Messing with onComplete callback, self
    will be dead letters")
      }
    }

    object HelloAkkaScala extends App {
      val system = ActorSystem("helloakka")
      val greeter = system.actorOf(Props[Greeter], "greeter")
      greeter ! Greet
    }

    Program output :

    Running HelloAkkaScala
    self is Actor[akka://helloakka/deadLetters]
    [ERROR] [06/18/2015 14:25:41.510]
    [helloakka-akka.actor.default-dispatcher-4]
    [akka://helloakka/user/greeter] Messing with onComplete callback,
    self will be dead letters
    java.lang.Exception: Messing with onComplete callback, self will
    be dead letters
    at Greeter$anonfun$receive$1.applyOrElse(HelloAkkaScala.scala:27)
    at akka.actor.Actor$class.aroundReceive(Actor.scala:467)
    at Greeter.aroundReceive(HelloAkkaScala.scala:8)
    at akka.actor.ActorCell.receiveMessage(ActorCell.scala:516)
    at akka.actor.ActorCell.invoke(ActorCell.scala:487)
    at akka.dispatch.Mailbox.processMailbox(Mailbox.scala:238)
    at akka.dispatch.Mailbox.run(Mailbox.scala:220)
    at
    
akka.dispatch.ForkJoinExecutorConfigurator$AkkaForkJoinTask.exec(AbstractDispatcher.scala:397)
    at
    scala.concurrent.forkjoin.ForkJoinTask.doExec(ForkJoinTask.java:260)
    at
    
scala.concurrent.forkjoin.ForkJoinPool$WorkQueue.runTask(ForkJoinPool.java:1339)
    at
    scala.concurrent.forkjoin.ForkJoinPool.runWorker(ForkJoinPool.java:1979)
    at
    
scala.concurrent.forkjoin.ForkJoinWorkerThread.run(ForkJoinWorkerThread.java:107)

    self is expexted to be Actor[akka://helloakka/user/greeter#990239115]
    Done (system still running)!
    [INFO] [06/18/2015 14:25:41.516]
    [helloakka-akka.actor.default-dispatcher-3]
    [akka://helloakka/deadLetters] Message [Done$
    <akka://helloakka/deadLetters]%20Message%20[Done$>] from
    Actor[akka://helloakka/deadLetters] to
    Actor[akka://helloakka/deadLetters] was not delivered. [1] dead
    letters encountered. This logging can be turned off or adjusted
    with configuration settings 'akka.log-dead-letters' and
    'akka.log-dead-letters-during-shutdown'.


--
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>>>>>>>>>> Check the FAQ: http://doc.akka.io/docs/akka/current/additional/faq.html
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*Dr. Roland Kuhn*
/Akka Tech Lead/
Typesafe <http://typesafe.com/> – Reactive apps on the JVM.
twitter: @rolandkuhn
<http://twitter.com/#%21/rolandkuhn>

--
>>>>>>>>>> Read the docs: http://akka.io/docs/
>>>>>>>>>> Check the FAQ: http://doc.akka.io/docs/akka/current/additional/faq.html
>>>>>>>>>> Search the archives: https://groups.google.com/group/akka-user
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     Check the FAQ: http://doc.akka.io/docs/akka/current/additional/faq.html
     Search the archives: https://groups.google.com/group/akka-user
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