1Event::Lib(3)         User Contributed Perl Documentation        Event::Lib(3)
2
3
4

NAME

6       Event::Lib - Perl extentions for event-based programming
7

SYNOPSIS

9           use Event::Lib;
10           use POSIX qw/SIGINT/;
11
12           my $seconds;
13           sub timer {
14               my $event = shift;
15               print "\r", ++$seconds;
16               $event->add(1);
17           }
18
19           sub reader {
20               my $event = shift;
21               my $fh = $event->fh;
22               print <$fh>;
23               $event->add;
24           }
25
26           sub signal {
27               my $event = shift;
28               print "Caught SIGINT\n";
29           }
30
31           my $timer  = timer_new(\&timer);
32           my $reader = event_new(\*STDIN, EV_READ, \&reader);
33           my $signal = signal_new(SIGINT, \&signal);
34
35           $timer->add(1);     # triggered every second
36           $reader->add;
37           $signal->add;
38
39           event_mainloop;
40

DESCRIPTION

42       This module is a Perl wrapper around libevent(3) as available from
43       <http://www.monkey.org/~provos/libevent/>.  It allows to execute a
44       function whenever a given event on a filehandle happens, a timeout
45       occurs or a signal is received.
46
47       Under the hood, one of the available mechanisms for asynchronously
48       dealing with events is used. This could be "select", "poll", "epoll",
49       "devpoll" or "kqueue". The idea is that you don't have to worry about
50       those details and the various interfaces they offer. Event::Lib offers
51       a unified interface  to all of them (but see "CONFIGURATION" further
52       below).
53
54       Once you've skimmed through the next two sections (or maybe even now),
55       you should have a look at "EXAMPLE: A SIMPLE TCP SERVER" to get a
56       feeling about how it all fits together.
57
58       There's also a section briefly mentioning other event modules on the
59       CPAN and how they differ from Event::Lib further below ("OTHER EVENT
60       MODULES").
61

INITIALIZATION

63       This happens via loading the module via use() or require():
64
65           use Event::Lib;
66
67       No further work is ever required.
68
69       Additionally, you may use the following two functions to retrieve some
70       information regarding the underlying libevent. These functions are
71       neither exported nor exportable so you have to call them fully package-
72       qualified:
73
74   * Event::Lib::get_version()
75       This returns the version of libevent this module was compiled against.
76
77   * Event::Lib::get_method()
78       This returns the kernel notification method used by libevent. This will
79       be one of "select", "poll", "epoll", "devpoll" and "kqueue".
80

EVENTS

82       The standard procedure is to create a few events and afterwards enter
83       the loop (using event_mainloop()) to wait for and handle the pending
84       events. This loop is truely global and shared even between forked
85       processes. The same is true for events that you register. They will all
86       be processed by the same loop, no matter where or how you create them.
87
88       Each event has a Perl function associated with itself that gets
89       triggered when the event is due. Further event handling is delayed
90       until the currently executing event handler is done. If you want an
91       event to be handled as soon as it becomes imminent, it has to run in
92       its own process so that it cannot be disturbed by other event handlers.
93       This is particularly important for timer-based events when you expect
94       those events to fire steadily every few seconds.
95
96       There's one more little thing to be aware of: Sometimes it may apear
97       that your events aren't triggered because they produce no output in
98       spite of your precious print() statements you put in. If you see no
99       output, then you're a victim of buffering. The solution is to turn on
100       autoflushing, so put
101
102           $| = 1;
103
104       at the top of your program if no output appears on your screen or
105       filehandles.
106
107       Event::Lib knows three different kind of events: a filehandle becomes
108       readable/writeable, timeouts and signals.
109

Watching filehandles

111       Most often you will have a set of filehandles that you want to watch
112       and handle simultaneously. Think of a webserver handling multiple
113       client requests. Such an event is created with event_new():
114
115   * event_new($fh, $flags, $function, [@args])
116       $fh is the filehandle you want to watch. $flags may be the bit-wise
117       ORing of "EV_READ", "EV_WRITE" and "EV_PERSIST". "EV_PERSIST" will make
118       the event persistent, that is: Once the event is triggered, it is not
119       removed from the event-loop. If you do not pass this flag, you have to
120       re-schedule the event in the event-handler $function.
121
122       $function is the callback that is executed when the given event
123       happened.  This function is always called with at least two arguments,
124       namely the event object itself which was created by the above
125       event_new() and an integer being the event-type that occured (which
126       could be "EV_WRITE", "EV_READ" or "EV_TIMEOUT").  @args is an optional
127       list of additional arguments your callback will receive.
128
129       NOTE: $fh really ought to be a socket or a pipe. Regular files can't be
130       handled by at least epoll(2). If, for some reason, you want to put an
131       event on a regular file, you have to make sure that a kernel
132       notification method is used that can deal with such file-handles.
133       select(2) and poll(2) are good candidates as they don't have this
134       limitation. So in order to prevent this limitation, you have to do:
135
136           BEGIN {
137               $ENV{ $_ } = 1 for qw/EVENT_NOEPOLL EVENT_NODEVPOLL EVENT_NOKQUEUE/;
138           }
139           use Event::Lib;
140
141       See "CONFIGURATION" further below for more details.
142
143       The function returns an event object (the very object that is later
144       passed to the callback function).
145
146       Here's an example how to create a listening socket that can accept
147       connections from multiple clients:
148
149           use IO::Socket::INET;
150           use Event::Lib;
151
152           sub accept_connection {
153               my $event = shift;
154               my $sock  = $event->fh;
155               my $client = $sock->accept;
156               ...
157           }
158
159           my $server = IO::Socket::INET->new(
160               LocalAddr       => 'localhost',
161               LocalPort       => 9000,
162               Proto           => 'tcp',
163               ReuseAddr       => SO_REUSEADDR,
164               Listen          => 1,
165               Blocking        => 0,
166           ) or die $@;
167
168           my $main = event_new($server, EV_READ|EV_PERSIST, \&accept_connection);
169
170           # add the event to the event loop
171           $main->add;
172
173           event_mainloop();
174
175       The above can be done without the "EV_PERSIST" flag as well:
176
177           sub accept_connection {
178               my $event = shift;
179               my $sock = $event->fh;
180               my $client = $sock->accept;
181               ...
182               # re-schedule event
183               $event->add;
184           }
185           ...
186           my $main = event_new($server, EV_READ, \&accept_connection);
187           $main->add;
188           event_mainloop();
189
190   * $event->add( [$timeout] )
191       Alias: event_add( $event, [$timeout] )
192
193       This adds the event previously created with event_new() to the event-
194       loop.  $timeout is an optional argument specifying a timeout given as
195       floating-point number. It means that the event handler is triggered
196       either when the event happens or when $timeout seconds have passed,
197       whichever comes first.
198
199       Consider this snippet:
200
201           use Event::Lib;
202
203           sub handler {
204               my ($ev, $type) = @_;
205               if ($type == EV_READ) {
206                   ...
207               }
208               elsif ($type == EV_TIMEOUT) {
209                   ...
210               }
211           }
212
213           # wait at most for 1.5 seconds
214           event_new(\*STDIN, EV_READ, \&handler)->add(1.5);
215           event_one_loop;
216
217       If "STDIN" becomes readable within 1.5 seconds, handler() will be
218       called with $type set to "EV_READ". If nothing happens within these 1.5
219       seconds, it'll be called with $type set to "EV_TIMEOUT".
220
221       When $timeout is 0 it behaves as if no timeout has been given, that is:
222       An infinite timeout is assumed. Any other timeout is taken literally,
223       so 0.0 is not the same! In such a case, the event handler will be
224       called immediately with the event type set to "EV_TIMEOUT".
225
226       It's a fatal error to add the same event multiple times:
227
228           my $e = event_new(...);
229           $e->add;
230           $e->add;    # this line will die
231
232       When an event couldn't be added for some other reason, the event's
233       exception handler is called. See "EXCEPTION HANDLING" further below on
234       how exceptions raised by event_add() differ from other exceptions.
235
236   * $event->fh
237       Returns the filehandle this $event is supposed to watch. You will
238       usually call this in the event-handler.
239
240   * $event->remove
241       This removes an event object from the event-loop. Note that the object
242       itself is not destroyed and freed. It is merely disabled and you can
243       later re-enable it by calling "$event->add".
244

Timer-based events

246       Sometimes you want events to happen periodically, regardless of any
247       filehandles.  Such events are created with timer_new():
248
249   * timer_new( $function, [@args] )
250       This is very much the same as event_new(), only that it lacks its first
251       two parameters.  $function is a reference to a Perl function that
252       should be executed. As always, this function will receive the event
253       object as returned by timer_new() as first argument, the type of event
254       (always EV_TIMEOUT) plus the optional argumentlist @args.
255
256   * $event->add( [$timeout] )
257       Alias: event_add( $event, [$timeout] )
258
259       Adds $event to the event-loop. The event is scheduled to be triggered
260       every $timeout seconds where $timeout can be any floating-point value.
261       If $timeout is omitted, a value of one second is assumed.
262
263       It will throw an exception if adding the given event failed. If you
264       still want your program to keep running, wrap this statement into an
265       eval block:
266
267           my $e = event_new(...);
268           eval {
269               $e->add;
270           } or warn "Adding failed";
271
272       Note that timer-based events are not persistent so you have to call
273       this method/function again in the event-handler in order to re-schedule
274       it.
275
276       It's a fatal error to add the same event multiple times:
277
278           my $e = timer_new(...);
279           $e->add;
280           $e->add;    # this line will die
281
282       When an event couldn't be added for some other reason, the event's
283       exception handler is called. See "EXCEPTION HANDLING" further below on
284       how exceptions raised by event_add() differ from other exceptions.
285
286   * $event->remove
287       This removes the timer-event $event from the event-loop. Again, $event
288       remains intact and may later be re-scheduled with event_add().
289

Signal-based events

291       Your program can also respond to signals sent to it by other
292       applications. To handle signals, you create the corresponding event
293       using signal_new().
294
295       Note that thusly created events take precedence over event-handlers
296       defined in %SIG. That means the function you assigned to $SIG{ $SIGNAME
297       } will never be executed if a "Event::Lib"-handler for $SIGNAME also
298       exists.
299
300   * signal_new( $signal, $function, [@args] )
301       Sets up $function as a handler for $signal. $signal has to be an
302       integer specifying which signal to intercept and handle. For example,
303       15 is "SIGTERM" (on most platforms, anyway). You are advised to use the
304       symbolic names as exported by the POSIX module:
305
306           use Event::Lib;
307           use POSIX qw/SIGINT/;
308
309           my $signal = signal_new(SIGINT, sub { print "Someone hit ctrl-c" });
310           $signal->add;
311           event_mainloop();
312
313       As always, $function receives the event object as first argument, the
314       event-type (always EV_SIGNAL) as second. @args specifies an option list
315       of values that is to be passed to the handler.
316
317   * $event->add( [$timeout] )
318       Alias: event_add( $event, [$timeout] )
319
320       Adds the signal-event previously created with signal_new() to the
321       event-loop.  $timeout is an optional argument specifying a timeout
322       given as floating-point number. It means that the event handler is
323       triggered either when the event happens or when $timeout seconds have
324       passed, whichever comes first.
325
326       $timeout here has the exact same semantics as with filehandle-based
327       events described further above.
328
329       Note that signal-events are always persistent unless $timeout was
330       given.  That means that you have to delete the event manually if you
331       want it to happen only once:
332
333           sub sigint {
334               my $event = shift;
335               print "Someone hit ctrl-c";
336               $event->remove;
337           }
338
339           my $signal = signal_new(SIGINT, \&sigint);
340           $signal->add;
341           event_mainloop();
342
343       Subsequently, a persistent and timeouted signal-handler would read
344       thusly:
345
346           sub sigint {
347               my $event = shift;
348               print "Someone hit ctrl-c";
349               $event->add(2.5);
350           }
351
352           my $signal = signal_new(SIGINT, \&sigint);
353           $signal->add(2.5);
354           event_mainloop();
355
356       It's a fatal error to add the same event multiple times:
357
358           my $e = signal_new(...);
359           $e->add;
360           $e->add;    # this line will die
361
362       When an event couldn't be added for some other reason, the event's
363       exception handler is called. See "EXCEPTION HANDLING" further below on
364       how exceptions raised by event_add() differ from other exceptions.
365
366   * $event->remove
367       The same as their counterparts for filehandle-events, so please see
368       above.
369

COMMON METHODS

371   * $event->pending
372       This will tell you whether $event is still in the event-queue waiting
373       to be processed.  More specifically, it returns a false value if $event
374       was already handled (and was not either persistent or re-scheduled). In
375       case $event is still in the queue it returns the amount of seconds as a
376       floating-point number until it is triggered again. If $event has no
377       attached timeout, it returns "0 but true".
378
379   * $event->args( [@args] )
380       When called with no arguments, it will in scalar context return the
381       number of additional arguments associated with $event. In list context,
382       it returns those arguments as one list.
383
384       When @args is given, the current list of arguments for $event is
385       replaced with @args and nothing is returned.
386
387   * $event->args_del
388       This will remove all additional arguments from $event so the next time
389       the event handler is called, the list of additional arguments passed to
390       it will be empty.
391
392   * $event->callback
393       Returns the callback associated with this event as code-reference so
394       that you can call it manually in case you think you need that:
395
396           $event->callback->($event, $event->fh, @args);
397
398   * $event->except_handler( $function )
399       You can associate an exception handler with each event which gets
400       called in case the callback for that event dies. $function is a Perl
401       code-reference which will - when called - receive the event as first
402       argument, the error message with which the event handler died, the type
403       of event and any additional arguments associated with that event. That
404       way you can inspect the circumstances and provide your own error-
405       handling.
406
407       Please see "EXCEPTION HANDLING" for some background and more details.
408

ENTERING THE EVENT-LOOP

410       Event::Lib offers three functions to process pending events.
411
412   * event_mainloop ()
413       This function will start the event-loop and never return, generally.
414       More precisely, it will return if either the program ran out of events
415       in which case event_mainloop() returns a true value. In case of an
416       error during event-processing, it will return a false value in which
417       case you should check $!.
418
419       IMPORTANT: When any of your events register new events they will be
420       added to the global queue of events and be handled in the same loop.
421       You are therefore not allowed to call event_mainloop() more than once
422       in your program.  Attempting to do so will yield a warning and the
423       operation is silently turned into a no-op.
424
425   * event_one_loop( [$timeout] )
426       This function will do exactly one loop which means the next pending
427       event is handled. In case no event is currently ready for processing,
428       it will block and wait until one becomes processible.
429
430       If $timeout is specified, it will wait at most $timeout seconds and
431       then return.
432
433   * event_one_nbloop ()
434       This is the non-blocking counterpart to event_one_loop(): It returns
435       immediately when no event is ready to be processed. Otherwise the next
436       imminent event is handled.
437
438       You want to use either event_one_loop() or event_one_nbloop() instead
439       of event_mainloop() if you want to write your own event-loop. The core
440       of such a program could look like this:
441
442           event_new(...)->add;
443           event_new(...)->add;
444           timer_new(...)->add;
445           ...
446
447           while () {
448               event_one_nbloop();
449               ...
450               select undef, undef, undef, 0.05;   # sleep for 0.05 seconds
451           }
452

EVENT LIFECYCLE

454       It is important to understand the lifetime of events because concepts
455       such as scope and visibility have little meaning with respect to
456       events.
457
458       When you add an event to the queue using event_add(), this event will
459       remain there until it is triggered, no matter what you do with the
460       object returned by event_new(), timer_new() and signal_new()
461       respectively. Consider this code:
462
463           use Event::Lib;
464           $| = 1;
465
466           my $event = timer_new(sub { print "timer called\n" });
467
468           # schedule the timer to go off in ten seconds
469           $event->add(10);
470
471           undef $event;
472           event_mainloop;
473
474       This program will, regardless of the "undef $event", print "timer
475       called".  As a consequence, there is only one true and correct way to
476       cancel an event, namely by calling remove() on it. Likewise:
477
478           use warnings;
479           use Event::Lib;
480           $| = 1;
481
482           my $event = timer_new(sub { print "Called after two seconds\n" });
483           $event->add(2);
484           $event = timer_new(sub { print "Called after three seconds\n" });
485           $event->add(3);
486
487           event_mainloop;
488
489           __END__
490           Explicit undef() of or reassignment to pending event at - line 8.
491           Called after two seconds
492           Called after three seconds
493
494       So even though you have only one Perl object container $event, you have
495       two events!
496
497       As this can become hard to maintain in complex programs, Event::Lib
498       will emmit a warning if any of the above cases is detected and if you
499       have warnings enabled. If you don't want this warning turn it off
500       temporarily. The above program then becomes:
501
502           use warnings;
503           use Event::Lib;
504           $| = 1;
505
506           my $event = timer_new(sub { print "Called after two seconds\n" });
507           $event->add(2);
508
509           {
510               no warnings 'misc';
511               $event = timer_new(sub { print "Called after three seconds\n" });
512               $event->add(3);
513           }
514
515           event_mainloop;
516
517       Note that the line following the undef() or the reassignment has to be
518       within the "no warnings 'misc'"-block because this is the line where
519       this warning is actually triggered and not the line with the undef() or
520       reassignment itself.
521

EXCEPTION HANDLING

523       Some programs simply cannot afford to die. It is a possible that a
524       callback is triggered and finds itself in a situation where it just
525       cannot proceed. Think of a callback that is supposed to append to a
526       file and in the meantime the disk has filled so that no space is left
527       on the device.
528
529       It is now possible to provide exception handlers for these cases. The
530       idea is that these exception handlers are called with the same
531       arguments the callback was previously triggered with (plus the error
532       message as second argument) which gives you the change to further
533       investigate the cause of the failure and possibly take counter-
534       measures.
535
536       You can register exception handlers per event using the
537       except_handler() method.  Furthermore, you can register one global
538       exception handler that is going to be used for all events that don't
539       have their own handler:
540
541   * event_register_except_handler( $function )
542       $function is a code-reference that will be called whenever the callback
543       of an event dies:
544
545           use Event::Lib;
546
547           sub handler {
548               my ($event, $exception, $type, @args) = @_;
549               # error handling here
550               ...
551           }
552
553           event_register_except_handler(\&handler);
554           ...
555
556       If you don't call event_register_except_handler() Event::Lib will use
557       its own basic default handler. This handler simply dies with the
558       original error message.
559
560   Exceptions raised by event_add()
561       If the exception was raised by event_add(), then the event's exception
562       handler is called. This is either the one registered with
563       except_handler() on a per-event basis, the global one set via
564       event_register_except_handler() or, if both of these was not done, the
565       default handler.
566
567       In any case, the exception handler called from event_add() is called
568       with slightly different arguments. This is in order to allow the
569       handler to distinguish between the case where an exception was raised
570       by an event-handler or where it was raised by event_add().
571
572       The first two arguments being the event in question and the error
573       message are the same for both kind of exceptions. What differs is the
574       third argument, $type. It will always be negative when event_add()
575       triggered this exception.
576
577       In particular, the type of event $type will be for a...
578
579       ... filehandle-event:
580           The negated type-flags with which the event was created. This means
581           that for the following exception-handler and when "$e->add" failed:
582
583               sub exception_handler {
584                   my ($e, $err, $evtype, @args) = @_;
585
586                   # ref($e) eq "Event::Lib::event"
587                   # $err =~ /^Couldn't add event at/
588                   # $evtype == -(EV_READ|EV_PERSIST)
589                   # @args == (1, 2, 3)
590                   # $! will contain the OS-level error
591               }
592
593               my $e = event_new(\*FH, EV_READ|EV_PERSIST, \&handler, 1 .. 3);
594               ...
595               $e->add;
596
597       ... timer-event:
598           $type will be -EV_TIMEOUT:
599
600               sub exception_handler {
601                   my ($e, $err, $evtype, @args) = @_;
602
603                   # ref($e) eq "Event::Lib::timer"
604                   # $err =~ /^Couldn't add event at/
605                   # $evtype == -EV_TIMEOUT
606                   # @args == (1, 2, 3)
607               }
608
609               my $e = timer_new(\&handler, 1 .. 3);
610               ...
611               $e->add;
612
613       ... signal-event:
614           $type will be the negated signal number this event was supposed to
615           handle:
616
617               sub exception_handler {
618                   my ($e, $err, $evtype, @args);
619
620                   # ref($e) eq "Event::Lib::signal"
621                   # $err =~ /^Couldn't add event at/
622                   # $evtype == -SIGTERM
623                   # @args == (1, 2, 3)
624               }
625
626               my $e = signal_new(SIGTERM, \&handler, 1 .. 3);
627               ...
628               $e->add;
629
630       As a consequence, first have your exception-handler test the sign of
631       $evtype.  If it was negative, use "ref($e)" to extract the kind of
632       event.
633

PRIORITIES

635       Events can be assigned a priority. The lower its assigned priority is,
636       the earlier this event is processed. Using prioritized events in your
637       programs requires two steps. The first one is to set the number of
638       available priorities.  Setting those should happen once in your script
639       and before calling event_mainloop():
640
641   * event_priority_init( $priorities )
642       Sets the number of different events to $priorities.
643
644       Assigning a priority to each event then happens thusly:
645
646   * $event->set_priority( $priority )
647       Gives $event (which can be any of the three type of events) the
648       priority $priority. Remember that a lower priority means the event is
649       processed earlier!
650
651       Note: If your installed version of libevent does not yet contain
652       priorities which happens for pre-1.0 versions, the above will become
653       no-ops. Other than that, your scripts will remain functional.
654

FUNCTIONS FOR DEBUGGING, TRACING ET AL.

656       There are some functions that will aid you in finding problems in your
657       program or even to assure you that your program is ok but there might
658       be a bug in Event::Lib.
659
660   * event_log_level( $loglevel )
661       You can specify what kind of messages Event::Lib should dump to stderr
662       by using thid function.
663
664       $loglevel is one of _EVENT_LOG_DEBUG, _EVENT_LOG_MSG, _EVENT_LOG_WARN,
665       _EVENT_LOG_ERR and _EVENT_LOG_NONE and will instruct Event::Lib to only
666       output messages of at least that severity. "_EVENT_LOG_NONE" will
667       suppress any messages. Not calling this function is equivalent to doing
668
669           event_log_level( _EVENT_LOG_ERR );
670
671   * $event->trace
672       This turns on tracing for $event. Tracing means that diagnostic
673       messages are written to STDERR whenever something happens to this
674       $event. This includes implicit action such as the destruction of an
675       event or explicit things like calling add() or remove() or other
676       methods on $event.
677
678       Returns $event so that you can easily plug it into your code:
679
680           event_new(...)->trace->add;
681
682       Once an event is traced, there is as of now no way to untrace it again.
683
684   * Event::Lib::Debug::get_pending_events()
685       This function is only available when you built Event::Lib with
686       "DEFINE=-DEVENT_LIB_DEBUG" (as an argument to perl Makefile.PL).
687       Additionally, you have to run your program with the environment
688       variable "EVENT_LIB_DEBUG_PENDING" set in order to get any output from
689       this function. The environment has to be set before "use Event::Lib;":
690
691           BEGIN {
692               $ENV{ EVENT_LIB_DEBUG_PENDING } = 1;
693           }
694
695           use Event::Lib;
696
697       or by setting it in your shell. For the bash, this looks like:
698
699           $ EVENT_LIB_DEBUG_PENDING=1 perl event_script.pl
700
701       This function will return a list of all currently still pending events.
702       Each element of this list is a reference to an array, where the first
703       element is the event object, the second the type of event
704       ("EV_TIMEOUT", "EV_SIGNAL", "EV_READ" etc.) and the remaining elements
705       the additional arguments this event was constructed with.
706
707   * Event::Lib::Debug::dump_pending_events()
708       Similar to the above, only that it will dump all currently pending
709       events to STDERR with some additional information that might be of
710       interest.
711
712       Again, this is only available when the module was build with
713       "-DEVENT_LIB_DEBUG" and with the environment variable
714       "EVENT_LIB_DEBUG_PENDING" set.
715

CONFIGURATION

717       Event::Lib can be told which kernel notification method not to use.
718       This happens via the use of environment variables (there is no other
719       way due to libevent). They have to be set in a BEGIN-block before you
720       use() Event::Lib:
721
722           BEGIN {
723               $ENV{ $_ } = 1 for qw/EVENT_NOPOLL EVENT_NOEPOLL/;
724           }
725
726           use Event::Lib;
727
728       This will disable "poll" and "epoll" so it will use one of the
729       remaining methods, which could be either "select", "devpoll" or
730       "kqueue".
731
732       The variables that you may set are the following:
733
734       ·   EVENT_NOPOLL
735
736       ·   EVENT_NOSELECT
737
738       ·   EVENT_NOEPOLL
739
740       ·   EVENT_NODEVPOLL
741
742       ·   EVENT_NOKQUEUE
743
744       If you set all of the above variables, it is a fatal error and you'll
745       receive the message "event_init: no event mechanism available". There
746       is one other variable available:
747
748       ·   EVENT_LOG_LEVEL
749
750           This is the environment-variable version of set_log_level()
751           intended to conveniently run your script more verbosely for
752           debugging purpose. The lower this value is, the more informational
753           output libevent produces on STDERR. "EVENT_LOG_LEVEL=0" means
754           maximum debugging output whereas "EVENT_LOG_LEVEL=4" means no
755           output at all:
756
757               $ EVENT_LOG_LEVEL=0 perl your_script.pl
758

EXAMPLE: A SIMPLE TCP SERVER

760       Here's a reasonably complete example how to use this library to create
761       a simple TCP server serving many clients at once. It makes use of all
762       three kinds of events:
763
764           use POSIX qw/SIGHUP/;
765           use IO::Socket::INET;
766           use Event::Lib;
767
768           $| = 1;
769
770           # Invoked when a new client connects to us
771           sub handle_incoming {
772               my $e = shift;
773               my $h = $e->fh;
774
775               my $client = $h->accept or die "Should not happen";
776               $client->blocking(0);
777
778               # set up a new event that watches the client socket
779               my $event = event_new($client, EV_READ|EV_PERSIST, \&handle_client);
780               $event->add;
781           }
782
783           # Invoked when the client's socket becomes readable
784           sub handle_client {
785               my $e = shift;
786               my $h = $e->fh;
787               printf "Handling %s:%s\n", $h->peerhost, $h->peerport;
788               while (<$h>) {
789                   print "\t$_";
790                   if (/^quit$/) {
791                       # this client says goodbye
792                       close $h;
793                       $e->remove;
794                       last;
795                   }
796               }
797           }
798
799           # This just prints the number of
800           # seconds elapsed
801           my $secs;
802           sub show_time {
803               my $e = shift;
804               print "\r", $secs++;
805               $e->add;
806           }
807
808           # Do something when receiving SIGHUP
809           sub sighup {
810               my $e = shift;
811               # a common thing to do would be
812               # re-reading a config-file or so
813               ...
814           }
815
816           # Create a listening socket
817           my $server = IO::Socket::INET->new(
818               LocalAddr   => 'localhost',
819               LocalPort   => 9000,
820               Proto       => 'tcp',
821               ReuseAddr   => SO_REUSEADDR,
822               Listen      => 1,
823               Blocking    => 0,
824           ) or die $@;
825
826           my $main  = event_new($server, EV_READ|EV_PERSIST, \&handle_incoming);
827           my $timer = timer_new(\&show_time);
828           my $hup   = signal_new(SIGHUP, \&sighup);
829
830           $_->add for $main, $timer, $hup;
831
832           event_mainloop;
833
834           __END__
835
836       You can test the above server with this little program of which you can
837       start a few several simultaneous instances:
838
839           use IO::Socket::INET;
840
841           my $server = IO::Socket::INET->new(
842               Proto       => 'tcp',
843               PeerAddr    => 'localhost',
844               PeerPort    => 9000,
845           ) or die $@;
846
847           print $server "HI!\n";
848           sleep 10;
849           print $server "quit\n";
850
851           __END__
852

OTHER EVENT MODULES

854       There are already a handful of similar modules on the CPAN. The two
855       most prominent ones are Event and the venerable POE framework.
856
857   Event
858       In its functionality it's quite close to Event::Lib with some
859       additional features not present in this module (you can watch
860       variables, for example).  Interface-wise, it's quite a bit heavier
861       while Event::Lib gets away with just a handful of functions and
862       methods. On the other hand, it has been around for years and so you may
863       expect Event to be rock-stable.
864
865       The one main advantage of Event::Lib appears to be in its innards. The
866       underlying libevent is capable of employing not just the "poll" and
867       "select" notification mechanisms but also other and possibly better
868       performing ones such as "kqueue", "devpoll" and "epoll" where
869       available.
870
871   POE
872       POE is definitely more than the above. It's really a threading
873       environment in disguise. Purely event-based techniques have
874       limitations, most notably that an event-handler blocks all other
875       pending events until it is done with its work.  It's therefore not
876       possible to write a parallel link-checker only with Event or
877       Event::Lib. You still need threads or fork(2) for that.
878
879       That's where POE enters the scene. It is truely capable of running jobs
880       in parallel. Such jobs are usually encapsulated in "POE::Component"
881       objects of which already quite a few premade ones exist on the CPAN.
882
883       This power comes at a price. POE has a somewhat steep learning-curve
884       and forces you to think in POE concepts. For medium- and large-sized
885       applications, this doesn't have to be a bad thing. Once grokked, it's
886       easy to add more components to your project, so it's almost infinitely
887       extensible.
888
889   Stem
890       Stem is a very close rival to POE and they are nose-to-nose when it
891       comes to features. However, Stem's design is a lot easier to understand
892       and to adapt to your need, mostly because it doesn't come up with its
893       own methodology and terminology. It is very well thought out without
894       being over-designed.
895
896       It's easy and straight-forward to do simple event-looping (it currently
897       comes with its own well-conceived event loop; additionally it can make
898       use of Event when available). So called Stem cells can be easily
899       plugged together to build big applications where these cells can run in
900       parallel, both in an asynchronous or synchronized fashion.
901
902       It's main drawback (as of now) is its lack of documentation. However,
903       It's been written in a clean way so its source can often serve as a
904       drop-in replacement for the lack of documentation.
905
906   Conclusion
907       Use the right tools for your job. Event::Lib and Event are good for
908       writing servers that serve many clients at once, or in general:
909       Anything that requires you to watch resources and do some work when
910       something interesting happens with those resources. Once the work
911       needed to be carried out per event gets too complex, you may still use
912       "fork".
913
914       Or you use Stem or POE. You get the watching and notifying capabilities
915       alright, but also the power to do things in parallel without creating
916       threads or child processes manually.
917

EXPORT

919       This modules exports by default the following functions:
920
921           event_init
922           event_log_level
923           event_priority_init
924           event_register_except_handler
925           event_fork
926
927           event_new
928           timer_new
929           signal_new
930
931           event_add
932
933           event_mainloop
934           event_one_loop
935           event_one_nbloop
936
937       plus the following constants:
938
939           EV_PERSIST
940           EV_READ
941           EV_SIGNAL
942           EV_TIMEOUT
943           EV_WRITE
944           _EVENT_LOG_DEBUG
945           _EVENT_LOG_MSG
946           _EVENT_LOG_WARN
947           _EVENT_LOG_ERR
948           _EVENT_LOG_NONE
949

BUGS

951       This library is not thread-safe.
952
953       The module has turned out to be quite stable under stress-situations
954       handling many thousands simultaneous connections with a very decent
955       performance which it owes to the underlying libevent. However, event-
956       based applications can reach a stupendous complexity and it is not
957       possible to foresee every kind of conceivable scenario.
958
959       If you therefore find a bug (a crash, a memory leak, inconsistencies or
960       omissions in this documentation, or just about anything else), don't
961       hesitate to contact me. See "AUTHOR" further below for details.
962

TO-DO

964       Thread-safety is high on the list. Recent libevent has thread-support
965       which will make this fairly easy.
966
967       Not all of libevent's public interface is implemented. The buffered
968       events are still missing. They will be added once I grok what they are
969       for.
970

THANKS

972       This module wouldn't be in its current state without the patient and
973       professional help of MailChannels Corporation
974       (http://www.mailchannels.com).  Over the course of five months, Stas
975       Bekman, Ken Simpson and Mike Smith exchanged hundreds of emails with
976       me, pointing out the many glitches that were in the module and coming
977       up with test-cases that made it possible for me to fix all these
978       issues.
979

SEE ALSO

981       libevent's home can be found at
982       <http://www.monkey.org/~provos/libevent/>. It contains further
983       references to event-based techniques.
984
985       Also the manpage of event(3).
986

VERSION

988       This is version 1.03.
989

AUTHOR

991       Tassilo von Parseval, <tassilo.von.parseval@rwth-aachen.de>
992
994       Copyright (C) 2004-2007 by Tassilo von Parseval
995
996       This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
997       under the same terms as Perl itself, either Perl version 5.8.4 or, at
998       your option, any later version of Perl 5 you may have available.
999
1000
1001
1002perl v5.28.0                      2007-07-29                     Event::Lib(3)
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