[libvirt] [RFC] Events API

David Lively dlively at virtualiron.com
Mon Sep 22 19:15:25 UTC 2008


Okay, at long last, I see what you mean (I think).  Apps using libvirt
events must register an EventImpl via virRegisterEventImpl.  Internally,
suppose we implement events via an anonymous pipe.  libvirt would call 

  EventImpl.addHandle(pipe_read_fd, POLLIN ..., __virHandleEvents, conn)

so the app's main loop would monitor fd (in whatever manner it chooses),
then call __virHandleEvents(fd, conn) when it detected activity.
__virHandleEvents would pull the event from the pipe and dispatch
handlers as appropriate.  We'd call eventImpl.removeHandle(pipe_read_fd)
when the domain goes away.  Am I finally on the right track??

If so, are you proposing that we simply make the existing src/events.h
interface public?  At this point, I don't see the need for anything but
addHandle and removeHandle (but I can see how the others might be useful
to libvirt eventually).

Dave


On Mon, 2008-09-22 at 16:22 +0100, Daniel P. Berrange wrote:
> No, this the wrong approach. This is defining an event loop impl - we 
> don't want todo that. We need to define an API to let an application 
> provide a set of callback for libvirt to talk to an existing event 
> loop impl. ie a way for libvirt to register FD watches and timeouts,
> not a way for apps to manually process libvirt events in this way this
> example shows.
> 
> The public API for this is along the lines of that currently defined 
> in the src/events.h file. 
> 
> There are a set of functions libvirt needs in order to register actions
> for FDs, and/or timeouts. So the public API should consist of a way
> to register impls of these APIs
> 
>   typedef int (*virEventAddHandleFunc)(int, int, virEventHandleCallback, void *);
>   typedef void (*virEventUpdateHandleFunc)(int, int);
>   typedef int (*virEventRemoveHandleFunc)(int);
> 
>   typedef int (*virEventAddTimeoutFunc)(int, virEventTimeoutCallback, void *);
>   typedef void (*virEventUpdateTimeoutFunc)(int, int);
>   typedef int (*virEventRemoveTimeoutFunc)(int);
> 
>    void virEventRegisterImpl(virEventAddHandleFunc addHandle,
>                              virEventUpdateHandleFunc updateHandle,
>                              virEventRemoveHandleFunc removeHandle,
>                              virEventAddTimeoutFunc addTimeout,
>                              virEventUpdateTimeoutFunc updateTimeout,
>                              virEventRemoveTimeoutFunc removeTimeout);
> 
> A separate  libvirt-glib.so, would provide a API call
> 
>      virEventRegisterGLib()
> 
> which calls virEventRegisterImpl() with a suitable implementation for
> glib. An application like virt-manager which uses glib and wants events
> would then calll virEventRegisterGLib(). If it had a custom event loop
> of its own, then it could call virEventRegisterImpl() directly with its
> special impl.
> 
> It may be worth making our public API even more closely aligned with
> dbus - see dbus-connection.h and dbus-server.h - so people writing
> glue functions for it could just reuse what they've already written
> for dbus.
> 
> typedef dbus_bool_t (* DBusAddWatchFunction)       (DBusWatch      *watch,
>                                                     void           *data);
> typedef void        (* DBusWatchToggledFunction)   (DBusWatch      *watch,
>                                                     void           *data);
> typedef void        (* DBusRemoveWatchFunction)    (DBusWatch      *watch,
>                                                     void           *data);
> 
> typedef dbus_bool_t (* DBusAddTimeoutFunction)     (DBusTimeout    *timeout,
>                                                     void           *data);
> typedef void        (* DBusTimeoutToggledFunction) (DBusTimeout    *timeout,
>                                                     void           *data);
> typedef void        (* DBusRemoveTimeoutFunction)  (DBusTimeout    *timeout,
>                                                     void           *data);
> 
> dbus_bool_t dbus_server_set_watch_functions         (DBusServer                *server,
>                                                      DBusAddWatchFunction       add_function,
>                                                      DBusRemoveWatchFunction    remove_function,
>                                                      DBusWatchToggledFunction   toggled_function,
>                                                      void                      *data,
>                                                      DBusFreeFunction           free_data_function);
> dbus_bool_t dbus_server_set_timeout_functions       (DBusServer                *server,
>                                                      DBusAddTimeoutFunction     add_function,
>                                                      DBusRemoveTimeoutFunction  remove_function,
>                                                      DBusTimeoutToggledFunction toggled_function,
>                                                      void                      *data,
>                                                      DBusFreeFunction           free_data_function);
> 
> A 'watch' in DBus terminology is a file descriptor monitor. 
> 
> Daniel




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