Calling launch without paranthesis in kotlin coroutines - kotlin-coroutines

I understand that launch is an extension function on CoroutineScope. But then I see it being used like this:
import kotlinx.coroutines.*
fun main() {
GlobalScope.launch { // launch a new coroutine in background and continue
delay(1000L) // non-blocking delay for 1 second (default time unit is ms)
println("World!") // print after delay
}
println("Hello,") // main thread continues while coroutine is delayed
Thread.sleep(2000L) // block main thread for 2 seconds to keep JVM alive
}
My understaning is that in kotlin one can define an infix function and then call it without any paranthesis. But from the documenation, I don't think launch is an infix function (in fact it has more than one parameter, so it can not be infix). It is also not a keyword in language. Then how is it called without any paranthesis?

The first two parameters are default parameters and the third one is High order function. When the last parameter is High order function then you can move Lamba out of parenthesis.
Suppose you have fun:
fun post(s:String="default", block:()->Unit){}
You call it in these ways:
post("1",{
})
You will get a suggestion Lamda should be moved out of parentheses
After moving out of parentheses:
post("1"){
}
Now you can remove the first parameter since it is default parameter
post {
}
https://kotlinlang.org/docs/reference/lambdas.html

Related

Synchronized conditional statement in Go

I have a method that may be used in multiple goroutines and run concurrently.
Inside this method, I have a conditional statement. If the conditional statement is true, I want all other goroutines calling this method to wait for one and only one of the goroutines to execute this conditional statement before proceeding to the next section.
For example:
type SomeClass struct {
mu sync.Mutex
}
func (c *SomeClass) SomeFunc() {
//Do some calculation
if condition {
//This part should be executed by only one goroutine if the condition is true.
//All others must wait for this to finish
}
//Additional calculations
}
And I want to use it like this:
func main(){
//initilize
go someClass.SomeFunc()
//If the condition is true, the following will wait at the conditional statement until the first one finishes the code inside the conditional block
//Once it's done, they can run concurrently
go someClass.SomeFunc()
go someClass.SomeFunc()
}
Edit
This is perhaps not the right design for this so I'm looking for any suggestions on how to implement this.
Edit2:
Note that each routine will have its own condition. This value of condition is not shared between threads. However, the work inside the condition should run only once only if the condition in 2 or more routines happens to be true at the same time.
You'll want a mutex protecting the condition from concurrent read/writes, and then a method for resetting the condition when you wish to execute the synchronous code again.
type SomeClass struct {
conditionMu sync.Mutex
condition bool
}
func (c *SomeClass) SomeFunc() {
// Lock the mutex, so that concurrent calls to SomeFunc will wait here.
c.conditionMu.Lock()
if c.condition {
// Synchronous code goes here.
// Reset the condition to false so that any waiting goroutines won't run the code inside this block again.
c.condition = false
}
// Unlock the mutex, and any waiting goroutines.
c.conditionMu.Unlock()
}
// ResetCondition sets the stored condition to true in a thread-safe manner.
func (c *SomeClass) ResetCondition() {
c.conditionMu.Lock()
c.condition = true
c.conditionMu.Unlock()
}
The other answers to this question were incorrect because they do not satisfy the requirements of the question.
If the lock is added outside the conditional statement, then it will act as a barrier and will force all routines to synchronize at that spot. This is not the point of this question. Suppose resolving the condition value takes a long time, we do not want to check the value one routine at a time. We want to let every process check the condition at once so if the condition is false, we can move forward without stopping.
We want to ensure that the goroutines run in parallel if the condition is not true. Adding a lock inside the method and outside the conditional statement will not allow that to happen.
The following solutions are correct and passed all tests and performed well.
Solution 1:
Use 2 nested conditional statement such as this:
Note that in this case, if the condition is false, no lock will be called and no synchronization is needed. Everything can run in parallel.
type SomeClass struct {
conditionMu sync.Mutex
rwMu sync.RWMutex
additionalWorkRequired bool
}
func (c *SomeClass) SomeFunc() {
//Do some work ...
//Note: The condition is not shared, some routines can have false and some true at the same time, which is fine.
condition := true;
// All routines can check this condition and go inside the block if the condition is true
if condition {
c.rwMutex.Lock()
c.additionalWorkRequired = true
c.rwMutex.Unlock()
//Lock so other routines can wait here for the first one
c.conditionMu.Lock()
if c.additionalWorkRequired {
// Synchronous code goes here.
c.additionalWorkRequired = false
}
//Unlock so all other processors can move forward in parallel
c.conditionMu.unlock()
}
//Finish up the remaining work
}
Solution 2:
Use the do function from sync/singleflight which can handle this situation automatically.
From documentation:
Do executes and returns the results of the given function, making sure that only one execution is in-flight for a given key at a time. If a duplicate comes in, the duplicate caller waits for the original to complete and receives the same results. The return value shared indicates whether v was given to multiple callers.
Edit:
Since many seem to be confused by this question and answer, I'm adding a use case which might make things more clear:
1. Send a HTTP Request
2. If the server returns an error saying credentials are incorrect (This is condition):
2.1. Save current credentials in a local variable
2.2. Acquire the mutex lock
2.2.1. Compare the shared credentials with the ones in the local variable(This is the second condition)
If they are the same, then replace them with new ones
2.3. Unlock
2.4. Retry request

Is * operator of std::shared_ptr thread safe?

I have a std::shared_ptr which changes asynchronously from a callback.
In main thread, I want to read the "latest" value and do complex calculations on it, and I do not care if the pointer's value changes while those calculations are running.
For this, I am simply making a copy of the contained value on the main thread:
// async thread
void callback(P new_data) {
smart_pointer_ = new_data;
}
// main thread loop!
Value copy_of_pointer_value = *smart_pointer_; // smart_pointer_ could be changing in callback right now
// do calcs with copy_of_pointer_value
Is this safe or should I be explicitly making a copy of the smart pointer before trying to read its value, like this:
// main thread loop!
auto smart_copy = smart_pointer_;
// I know I could work with *smart_copy directly, but I need to copy anyway for other reasons
Value copy_of_pointer_value = *smart_copy;
// do calcs with copy_of_pointer_value

Ensuring a value is retrieved only once

I'm developing a Go package to access a web service (via HTTP). Every time I retrieve a page of data from that service, I also get the total of pages available. The only way to get this total is by getting one of the pages (usually the first one). However, requests to this service take time and I need to do the following:
When the GetPage method is called on a Client and the page is retrieved for the first time, the retrieved total should be stored somewhere in that client. When the Total method is called and the total hasn't yet been retrieved, the first page should be fetched and the total returned. If the total was retrieved before, either by a call to GetPage or Total, it should be returned immediately, without any HTTP requests at all. This needs to be safe for use by multiple goroutines. My idea is something along the lines of sync.Once but with the function passed to Do returning a value, which is then cached and automatically returned whenever Do is called.
I remember seeing something like this before, but I can't find it now even though I tried. Searching for sync.Once with value and similar terms didn't yield any useful results. I know I could probably do that with a mutex and a lot of locking, but mutexes and a lot of locking don't seem to be the recommended way to do stuff in go.
General "init-once" solution
In the general / usual case, the easiest solution to only init once, only when it's actually needed is to use sync.Once and its Once.Do() method.
You don't actually need to return any value from the function passed to Once.Do(), because you can store values to e.g. global variables in that function.
See this simple example:
var (
total int
calcTotalOnce sync.Once
)
func GetTotal() int {
// Init / calc total once:
calcTotalOnce.Do(func() {
fmt.Println("Fetching total...")
// Do some heavy work, make HTTP calls, whatever you want:
total++ // This will set total to 1 (once and for all)
})
// Here you can safely use total:
return total
}
func main() {
fmt.Println(GetTotal())
fmt.Println(GetTotal())
}
Output of the above (try it on the Go Playground):
Fetching total...
1
1
Some notes:
You can achieve the same using a mutex or sync.Once, but the latter is actually faster than using a mutex.
If GetTotal() has been called before, subsequent calls to GetTotal() will not do anything but return the previously calculated value, this is what Once.Do() does / ensures. sync.Once "tracks" if its Do() method has been called before, and if so, the passed function value will not be called anymore.
sync.Once provides all the needs for this solution to be safe for concurrent use from multiple goroutines, given that you don't modify or access the total variable directly from anywhere else.
Solution to your "unusal" case
The general case assumes the total is only accessed via the GetTotal() function.
In your case this does not hold: you want to access it via the GetTotal() function and you want to set it after a GetPage() call (if it has not yet been set).
We may solve this with sync.Once too. We would need the above GetTotal() function; and when a GetPage() call is performed, it may use the same calcTotalOnce to attempt to set its value from the received page.
It could look something like this:
var (
total int
calcTotalOnce sync.Once
)
func GetTotal() int {
calcTotalOnce.Do(func() {
// total is not yet initialized: get page and store total number
page := getPageImpl()
total = page.Total
})
// Here you can safely use total:
return total
}
type Page struct {
Total int
}
func GetPage() *Page {
page := getPageImpl()
calcTotalOnce.Do(func() {
// total is not yet initialized, store the value we have:
total = page.Total
})
return page
}
func getPageImpl() *Page {
// Do HTTP call or whatever
page := &Page{}
// Set page.Total from the response body
return page
}
How does this work? We create and use a single sync.Once in the variable calcTotalOnce. This ensures that its Do() method may only call the function passed to it once, no matter where / how this Do() method is called.
If someone calls the GetTotal() function first, then the function literal inside it will run, which calls getPageImpl() to fetch the page and initialize the total variable from the Page.Total field.
If GetPage() function would be called first, that will also call calcTotalOnce.Do() which simply sets the Page.Total value to the total variable.
Whichever route is walked first, that will alter the internal state of calcTotalOnce, which will remember the total calculation has already been run, and further calls to calcTotalOnce.Do() will never call the function value passed to it.
Or just use "eager" initialization
Also note that if it is likely that this total number have to be fetched during the lifetime of your program, it might not worth the above complexity, as you may just as easily initialize the variable once, when it's created.
var Total = getPageImpl().Total
Or if the initialization is a little more complex (e.g. needs error handling), use a package init() function:
var Total int
func init() {
page := getPageImpl()
// Other logic, e.g. error handling
Total = page.Total
}

Lossless rate-limiting in RxJS with queue clearing

In rxjs5, I'm trying to implement a Throttler class.
import Rx from 'rxjs/rx';
export default class Throttler {
constructor(interval) {
this.timeouts = [];
this.incomingActions = new Rx.Subject();
this.incomingActions
.concatMap(action => Rx.Observable.just(action).delay(interval / 2))
.subscribe(action => action());
}
clear() {
// How do I do this?
}
do(action) {
this.incomingActions.next(action);
}
}
The following invariants must hold:
every action passed to do gets added to an action queue
the action queue gets processed in order and at a fixed interval as determined by the constructor parameter
the action queue can be cleared using clear().
My current implementation, as seen above, handles the fixed interval, but I don't know how to clear the queue. It also has the problem that all actions are delayed by interval / 2ms even when the queue is empty.
P.S. The way I describe the invariants maps very easily to an implementation with setInterval and an array as a queue, but I'm wondering how I would do this with Rx.
This seems like not a good place for the default Subject class. Extending it with your own subclass would be better because of reasons you listed.
However, in your case I'd try to identify each action that comes to .do(action) method with some index and add .filter() operator before subscribe() to be able to cancel particular actions by checking some array for what indices are marked as canceled. Since you're using concatMap() you know that actions will be always called in the order they were added. Then clear() method that you want would just mark all actions to be canceled in the array.
You can also add .do() operator after concatMap() and keep track of how many action are scheduled at the moment with some accumulator. Adding action would cause scheduledAction++ while passing .do() right before .subscribe() would scheduledAction--. Then you can use this variable to decide whether you want to chain a new action with .delay(interval / 2) or not.

Is there a way to simplify typing Swift trailing closure?

Trailing closure make code more readable, but the coding process is not enjoyable at all. For example, when I want to type this kind of method (shown below) that only takes one closure parameter. There is no Code hint for choosing trailing closure:
I have to delete content inside(), and type the complete closure like that :
Is there a way to make this easier?
Type ENTER twice, once to complete the method name, a second time to automatically format the closure.
When I begin to type the function name:
After hitting ENTER once:
Then, after hitting ENTER a second time:
To sum up: type the first letters of the function, wait for auto-suggest, then hit ENTER then ENTER again.
If the closure takes parameters, you just do:
actionButton.snp_makeConstraints { make in
// Stuff
}
Multiple params:
actionButton.snp_makeConstraints { make, extraParam in
// Stuff
}
No params:
actionButton.snp_makeConstraints {
// Stuff
}
For future reference: http://goshdarnclosuresyntax.com

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