Re: Ruby Based App Server

may i offer a suggestion for the communication protocol for this
promising App Server you all are cooking up?

i recently needed to create an mini-app server myself for my accounting
application in order to make it a 3-tier system. so i created ONI or
Object Network Interface (very soon to be put on the RAA). the best part
is that it uses YAML for message headers and serialization of objects.
it works fantastically! it just needs to be beefed up. would you all be
interested in using it in your pursuits? (i also would like to get it
using the philosopy of REST if possible)

~tom

p.s. BTW, here's that DB pool code i was talking about before:

--=-=-=
Content-Type: application/octet-stream
Content-Disposition: attachment; filename=dbasePool.rb

require 'config'
require 'dbi'
require 'thread'

=begin
=end

class DbasePool
  @@classMutex = Mutex.new
  @@connectionFreed = ConditionVariable.new
  @@instance = nil
  @monitorThread
  @pool
  @poolSize
  @monitorThread
  
  attr_reader :host, :dbaseName 
  attr_reader :userName, :password, :monitorInterval

  def initialize(host = nil, dbaseName = nil, userName = nil, password =
nil, 
		 poolSize = 5, monitorInterval = 3600)
    if @@instance then raise "Attempted to re-init DbasePool" end

    @@classMutex.synchronize {
      @host = host
      @dbaseName = dbaseName
      @userName = userName
      @password = password
      @poolSize = poolSize
      @monitorInterval = monitorInterval #in seconds, 0 to disable
monitoring.
      @pool = []
      0.upto(@poolSize-1) do |i|
	conn = @pool[i] = connect
	class << conn
	  attr_accessor :status
	  attr_accessor :parent
	  def freeConnection
	    parent.freeConnection(self)
	  end
	  #Now override several DBI's methods. 
	  #The default methods suck big time.
	  #Also, the MySQL DBD driver does not 
	  #reflect true capability of MySQL.
	  #So, the following changes allows for nested transaction,
	  #and also provide transaction for any database that support it
	  #regardless of what the DBD driver may say.
	  attr_accessor :transaction_depth
	  def begin_transaction
	    if @transaction_depth == 0
	      self.do("BEGIN")
	      puts "DBASE_POOL: Transaction started"
	    end
	    @transaction_depth += 1
	  end
	  def commit_transaction
	    if @transaction_depth == 1
	      self.do("COMMIT")
	      puts "DBASE_POOL: Transaction stopped"
	    end
	    @transaction_depth -= 1
	  end
	  def rollback_transaction
	    if @transaction_depth == 1
	      self.do("ROLLBACK")
	      puts "DBASE_POOL: Transaction rolled back"
	    end
	    @transaction_depth -= 1
          end
	  def transaction
	    raise InterfaceError, 
	      "Database connection was already closed!" if @handle.nil?
	    raise InterfaceError, "No block given" unless block_given?
	    begin_transaction
	    begin
	      yield self
	      commit_transaction
	    rescue Exception
	      rollback_transaction
	      raise
	    end
	  end
	end
	conn.status = "IDLE"
	conn.parent = self
	conn.transaction_depth = 0 
      end
      @monitorThread = Thread.new do 
	while(true) 
	  sleep(monitorInterval)
	  @@classMutex.synchronize {
	    #puts "HAI, monitoring is awake"
	    @pool.each do |conn|
	      if (conn.status == "IDLE") && (not conn.ping)
		conn = connect
	      end
	    end
	  }
	end
      end
      @@instance = self
    }
  end


  def connect
    DBI.connect("DBI:Mysql:#{@dbaseName}:#{@host}", @userName,
@password)
  end 
  

  #What's the destructor name in Ruby?
  def finish
    @@classMutex.synchronize {
      @monitorThread.stop
      @pool.each do |conn| 
	conn.disconnect
      end
    }
  end


  #Get the next idle connection. If there is no idle connection, will
block
  #until there is one.
  #Optionally accepts a block. If a block is given, will execute the
block
  #and free up the connection afterwards.
  def getConnection
    idleConn = nil #predeclare
    @@classMutex.synchronize {
      callcc do |cont| 
	idleConn = @pool.find do |conn| 
	  conn.status == "IDLE" 
	end
	if not idleConn
	  puts "No more free connection in DBASE_POOL. Waiting..."
	  puts @@instance.inspect
	  puts caller.join("\n")
	  @@connectionFreed.wait(@@classMutex)
	  puts "DBASE_POOL: a connection is freed. Resuming."
	  cont.call
	end
      end
      idleConn.status = "BUSY"
    }
    if block_given? 
      yield idleConn
      idleConn.freeConnection
    else
      idleConn
    end
  end
  

  def freeConnection(usedConn)
    conn = nil       #predeclare
    @@classMutex.synchronize {
      conn = @pool.find do |conn| 
	conn == usedConn
      end
    }
    if conn
      conn.status = "IDLE"
      @@connectionFreed.signal
    else
      raise "Cannot found the referred connection!"
    end
  end
end		 





# Initialise DBASE_POOL
DBASE_POOL = DbasePool.new(Config::DBASE_HOST, 
			   Config::DBASE_DBNAME,
			   Config::DBASE_USER,
			   Config::DBASE_PASSWORD)









if $0 == __FILE__
  #test, and also benchmark.
  #on AMD-K62 400MHz, can do 217 SELECT NOW() statements per second.
  1.upto(1000) do |i|
    puts i if i % 100 == 0 
    dbh = []
    1.upto(5) do |i|
      dbh[i] = DBASE_POOL.getConnection
    end
    1.upto(5) do |i|
      dbh[i].execute("SELECT NOW()")
    end
    1.upto(5) do |i|
      DBASE_POOL.freeConnection dbh[i]
    end 
    1.upto(5) do 
      DBASE_POOL.getConnection do |dbh|
	dbh.execute("SELECT NOW()")
      end
    end
  end
end


--=-=-=--
<^>


On Tue, 2002-08-27 at 23:43, Edward Wilson wrote:
> > What does the Ruby community think?
> 
> I have wrestled for 6 months with a idea of writing somthing like this
> in C++ and embedding Ruby into a C++ shell of rich objects. 
> Ultimately I would extend the server using both C/C++ and Ruby.
> 
> I have recently come to the conclusion that writing such a beast in
> pure Ruby is the only way.  Writing an app server covers so much
> ground.  The implementation could remain a prototype for three years
> if it were written in C++.  Ruby would be the only way to get off the
> ground in less than a year.  Porting would be much easier if the
> server were written in pure Ruby.
> 
> Application servers are mini-operating systems in their own right.
> 
> iPlanet was a disaster; JBoss, BEA, JRun, and Tomcat are fantastic
> implementations.  Even Zope/Python has made a run.
> 
> 
> //ed
> 
-- 
~transami