libraries are not re-entrant; particularly, memory allocation and I/O
routines are not. That meant that doing nearly I<anything> in your
handler could in theory trigger a memory fault and subsequent core
-dump - see L<Deferred Signals> below.
+dump - see L</Deferred Signals (Safe Signals)> below.
The names of the signals are the ones listed out by C<kill -l> on your
system, or you can retrieve them from the Config module. Set up an
}
Another interesting signal to send is signal number zero. This doesn't
-actually affect another process, but instead checks whether it's alive
+actually affect a child process, but instead checks whether it's alive
or has changed its UID.
unless (kill 0 => $kid_pid) {
warn "something wicked happened to $kid_pid";
}
+When directed at a process whose UID is not identical to that
+of the sending process, signal number zero may fail because
+you lack permission to send the signal, even though the process is alive.
+You may be able to determine the cause of failure using C<%!>.
+
+ unless (kill 0 => $pid or $!{EPERM}) {
+ warn "$pid looks dead";
+ }
+
You might also want to employ anonymous functions for simple signal
handlers:
the F<t/lib/posix.t> file from the Perl source distribution has some
examples in it.
+=head2 Handling the SIGHUP Signal in Daemons
+
+A process that usually starts when the system boots and shuts down
+when the system is shut down is called a daemon (Disk And Execution
+MONitor). If a daemon process has a configuration file which is
+modified after the process has been started, there should be a way to
+tell that process to re-read its configuration file, without stopping
+the process. Many daemons provide this mechanism using the C<SIGHUP>
+signal handler. When you want to tell the daemon to re-read the file
+you simply send it the C<SIGHUP> signal.
+
+Not all platforms automatically reinstall their (native) signal
+handlers after a signal delivery. This means that the handler works
+only the first time the signal is sent. The solution to this problem
+is to use C<POSIX> signal handlers if available, their behaviour
+is well-defined.
+
+The following example implements a simple daemon, which restarts
+itself every time the C<SIGHUP> signal is received. The actual code is
+located in the subroutine C<code()>, which simply prints some debug
+info to show that it works and should be replaced with the real code.
+
+ #!/usr/bin/perl -w
+
+ use POSIX ();
+ use FindBin ();
+ use File::Basename ();
+ use File::Spec::Functions;
+
+ $|=1;
+
+ # make the daemon cross-platform, so exec always calls the script
+ # itself with the right path, no matter how the script was invoked.
+ my $script = File::Basename::basename($0);
+ my $SELF = catfile $FindBin::Bin, $script;
+
+ # POSIX unmasks the sigprocmask properly
+ my $sigset = POSIX::SigSet->new();
+ my $action = POSIX::SigAction->new('sigHUP_handler',
+ $sigset,
+ &POSIX::SA_NODEFER);
+ POSIX::sigaction(&POSIX::SIGHUP, $action);
+
+ sub sigHUP_handler {
+ print "got SIGHUP\n";
+ exec($SELF, @ARGV) or die "Couldn't restart: $!\n";
+ }
+
+ code();
+
+ sub code {
+ print "PID: $$\n";
+ print "ARGV: @ARGV\n";
+ my $c = 0;
+ while (++$c) {
+ sleep 2;
+ print "$c\n";
+ }
+ }
+ __END__
+
+
=head1 Named Pipes
A named pipe (often referred to as a FIFO) is an old Unix IPC
just like a regular, connected anonymous pipes, except that the
processes rendezvous using a filename and don't have to be related.
-To create a named pipe, use the Unix command mknod(1) or on some
+To create a named pipe, use the C<POSIX::mkfifo()> function.
+
+ use POSIX qw(mkfifo);
+ mkfifo($path, 0700) or die "mkfifo $path failed: $!";
+
+You can also use the Unix command mknod(1) or on some
systems, mkfifo(1). These may not be in your normal path.
# system return val is backwards, so && not ||
chdir; # go home
$FIFO = '.signature';
- $ENV{PATH} .= ":/etc:/usr/games";
while (1) {
unless (-p $FIFO) {
unlink $FIFO;
- system('mknod', $FIFO, 'p')
- && die "can't mknod $FIFO: $!";
+ require POSIX;
+ POSIX::mkfifo($FIFO, 0700)
+ or die "can't mkfifo $FIFO: $!";
}
# next line blocks until there's a reader
sleep 2; # to avoid dup signals
}
-=head2 Deferred Signals
+=head2 Deferred Signals (Safe Signals)
In Perls before Perl 5.7.3 by installing Perl code to deal with
signals, you were exposing yourself to danger from two things. First,
which will just restart. That means you have to C<die> to longjump(3) out
of the handler. Even this is a little cavalier for the true paranoiac,
who avoids C<die> in a handler because the system I<is> out to get you.
-The pragmatic approach was to say ``I know the risks, but prefer the
-convenience'', and to do anything you wanted in your signal handler,
+The pragmatic approach was to say "I know the risks, but prefer the
+convenience", and to do anything you wanted in your signal handler,
and be prepared to clean up core dumps now and again.
In Perl 5.7.3 and later to avoid these problems signals are
Note that the default in Perl 5.7.3 and later is to automatically use
the C<:perlio> layer.
+Note that some networking library functions like gethostbyname() are
+known to have their own implementations of timeouts which may conflict
+with your timeouts. If you are having problems with such functions,
+you can try using the POSIX sigaction() function, which bypasses the
+Perl safe signals (note that this means subjecting yourself to
+possible memory corruption, as described above). Instead of setting
+C<$SIG{ALRM}>:
+
+ local $SIG{ALRM} = sub { die "alarm" };
+
+try something like the following:
+
+ use POSIX qw(SIGALRM);
+ POSIX::sigaction(SIGALRM,
+ POSIX::SigAction->new(sub { die "alarm" }))
+ or die "Error setting SIGALRM handler: $!\n";
+
+=item Restartable system calls
+
+On systems that supported it, older versions of Perl used the
+SA_RESTART flag when installing %SIG handlers. This meant that
+restartable system calls would continue rather than returning when
+a signal arrived. In order to deliver deferred signals promptly,
+Perl 5.7.3 and later do I<not> use SA_RESTART. Consequently,
+restartable system calls can fail (with $! set to C<EINTR>) in places
+where they previously would have succeeded.
+
+Note that the default C<:perlio> layer will retry C<read>, C<write>
+and C<close> as described above and that interrupted C<wait> and
+C<waitpid> calls will always be retried.
+
=item Signals as "faults"
Certain signals e.g. SEGV, ILL, BUS are generated as a result of
"loop". In future Perl's signal mechanism may be changed to avoid this
- perhaps by simply disallowing %SIG handlers on signals of that
type. Until then the work-round is not to set a %SIG handler on those
-signals. (Which signals they are is operating system dependant.)
+signals. (Which signals they are is operating system dependent.)
=item Signals triggered by operating system state
=back
+If you want the old signal behaviour back regardless of possible
+memory corruption, set the environment variable C<PERL_SIGNALS> to
+C<"unsafe"> (a new feature since Perl 5.8.1).
+
=head1 Using open() for IPC
Perl's basic open() statement can also be used for unidirectional
# add error processing as above
$pid = open(KID_TO_WRITE, "|-");
- $SIG{ALRM} = sub { die "whoops, $program pipe broke" };
+ $SIG{PIPE} = sub { die "whoops, $program pipe broke" };
if ($pid) { # parent
for (@data) {
# NOTREACHED
}
+Since Perl 5.8.0, you can also use the list form of C<open> for pipes :
+the syntax
+
+ open KID_PS, "-|", "ps", "aux" or die $!;
+
+forks the ps(1) command (without spawning a shell, as there are more than
+three arguments to open()), and reads its standard output via the
+C<KID_PS> filehandle. The corresponding syntax to write to command
+pipes (with C<"|-"> in place of C<"-|">) is also implemented.
+
Note that these operations are full Unix forks, which means they may not be
correctly implemented on alien systems. Additionally, these are not true
multithreading. If you'd like to learn more about threading, see the
my $rtime = ' ';
read(SOCKET, $rtime, 4);
close(SOCKET);
- my $histime = unpack("N", $rtime) - $SECS_of_70_YEARS ;
+ my $histime = unpack("N", $rtime) - $SECS_of_70_YEARS;
printf "%8d %s\n", $histime - time, ctime($histime);
}
use strict;
my ($rendezvous, $line);
- $rendezvous = shift || '/tmp/catsock';
+ $rendezvous = shift || 'catsock';
socket(SOCK, PF_UNIX, SOCK_STREAM, 0) || die "socket: $!";
connect(SOCK, sockaddr_un($rendezvous)) || die "connect: $!";
while (defined($line = <SOCK>)) {
sub spawn; # forward declaration
sub logmsg { print "$0 $$: @_ at ", scalar localtime, "\n" }
- my $NAME = '/tmp/catsock';
+ my $NAME = 'catsock';
my $uaddr = sockaddr_un($NAME);
my $proto = getprotobyname('tcp');
$client->autoflush(1);
print $client "Welcome to $0; type help for command list.\n";
$hostinfo = gethostbyaddr($client->peeraddr);
- printf "[Connect from %s]\n", $hostinfo->name || $client->peerhost;
+ printf "[Connect from %s]\n", $hostinfo ? $hostinfo->name : $client->peerhost;
print $client "Command? ";
while ( <$client>) {
next unless /\S/; # blank line
($hispaddr = recv(SOCKET, $rtime, 4, 0)) || die "recv: $!";
($port, $hisiaddr) = sockaddr_in($hispaddr);
$host = gethostbyaddr($hisiaddr, AF_INET);
- $histime = unpack("N", $rtime) - $SECS_of_70_YEARS ;
+ $histime = unpack("N", $rtime) - $SECS_of_70_YEARS;
printf "%-12s ", $host;
printf "%8d %s\n", $histime - time, scalar localtime($histime);
$count--;
my $id = msgget(IPC_PRIVATE, IPC_CREAT | S_IRWXU);
my $sent = "message";
- my $type = 1234;
+ my $type_sent = 1234;
my $rcvd;
my $type_rcvd;
try to pass open file descriptors over a local UDP datagram socket if you
want your code to stand a chance of being portable.
-As mentioned in the signals section, because few vendors provide C
-libraries that are safely re-entrant, the prudent programmer will do
-little else within a handler beyond setting a numeric variable that
-already exists; or, if locked into a slow (restarting) system call,
-using die() to raise an exception and longjmp(3) out. In fact, even
-these may in some cases cause a core dump. It's probably best to avoid
-signals except where they are absolutely inevitable. This
-will be addressed in a future release of Perl.
-
=head1 AUTHOR
Tom Christiansen, with occasional vestiges of Larry Wall's original
There's a lot more to networking than this, but this should get you
started.
-For intrepid programmers, the indispensable textbook is I<Unix Network
-Programming> by W. Richard Stevens (published by Addison-Wesley). Note
-that most books on networking address networking from the perspective of
-a C programmer; translation to Perl is left as an exercise for the reader.
+For intrepid programmers, the indispensable textbook is I<Unix
+Network Programming, 2nd Edition, Volume 1> by W. Richard Stevens
+(published by Prentice-Hall). Note that most books on networking
+address the subject from the perspective of a C programmer; translation
+to Perl is left as an exercise for the reader.
The IO::Socket(3) manpage describes the object library, and the Socket(3)
manpage describes the low-level interface to sockets. Besides the obvious
https://perl5.git.perl.org / perl5.git / blobdiff