Messages in this thread | | | Date | Sat, 27 Oct 2007 10:51:25 +0200 | From | Marc Lehmann <> | Subject | Re: epoll design problems with common fork/exec patterns |
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On Sat, Oct 27, 2007 at 10:23:17AM +0200, Eric Dumazet <dada1@cosmosbay.com> wrote: > > In this case, the parent process works fine until the child closes fds, > > after which the fds become unarmed in the parent too. This works as > > I have no idea what exact problem you have.
Well, I explained it rather succinctly, I think. If you tell me whats unclear I can explain...
> But if the child closes some > file descriptor that were 'cloned' at fork() time, this only decrements a > refcount, and definitely should not close it for the 'parent'.
It doesn't. It removes it from the epoll set, though, so the parent will not receive events for that fd anymore.
> I have some apps that are happily using epoll() and fork()/exec() and have
The problem I described is fork/close/exec. close being the explicit syscall.
> no problem at all. I usually use O_CLOEXEC so that all close() are done at > exec() time without having to do it in a loop. epoll continues to work as > expected in the parent process.
This is because epoll doesn't behave like documented: It removes the fd from the parents epoll set only on an explicit close() syscall, not on an implicit close from exec.
> >fd sets. This would explain the behaviour above. Unfortunately (or > >fortunately?) this is not what happens: when the fds are being closed by > >exec or exit, the fds do not get removed from the epoll set. > > at exec() (granted CLOEXEC is asserted) or exit() time, only the refcount > of each file is decremented. Only if their refcount becomes NULL, files are > then removed from epoll set.
Yes. But thats obviously not the only way to close fds.
> >Is epoll really designed to be so incompatible with the most commno fork > >patterns? Shouldn't epoll do refcounting, as is commonly done under > >Unix? As the fd space is not shared between rpocesses, why does epoll > >try? Shouldn't the epoll information be copied just like the fd table > >itself, memory, and other resources? > > Too many questions here, showing lack of understanding.
You already said you don't the problem. No need to get insulting :(
> epoll definitly is not useless. It is used on major and critical apps. > You certainly missed something.
Well, it behaves like documented, which is the problem. You admit you don't understand the problem or the documentation, so again, no need to insult me.
> Please provide some code to illustrate one exact problem you have.
// assume there is an open epoll set that listens for events on fd 5 if (fork () = 0) { close (5); // fd 5 is now removed from the epoll set of the parent. _exit (0); }
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