In one documentation they say IHandleMessages handler hast to be written this way (signature is automatically generated when I choose to "Implement interface" option in Visual Studio):
public class PlaceOrderHandler : IHandleMessages<PlaceOrder>
{
public Task Handle(PlaceOrder message, IMessageHandlerContext context)
{
var orderPlaced = new OrderPlaced { OrderId = message.OrderId };
return context.Publish(orderPlaced);
}
}
While another documentation says it has to be written this way:
public class PlaceOrderHandler : IHandleMessages<PlaceOrder>
{
public async Task Handle(PlaceOrder message, IMessageHandlerContext context)
{
var orderPlaced = new OrderPlaced { OrderId = message.OrderId };
await context.Publish<OrderPlaced>(e => { e.OrderId = message.OrderId; });
}
}
I wonder what is the difference between these two statements, can someone explain in simple language?
Which option is the right one?
Both are correct options. The difference between the two is how a single asynchronous operation is handles in the Handle method.
In the first case, a Task is returned as-is. In the second case, publishing is awaited within the Handle method. The difference? In the first case no async state machine is created by the compiler as the task of publishing returned back. In the second scenario, a state machine is created.
Which option is the right one to use? They are both correct options. If a method is called frequently and you care for the unnecessary allocations not to take place, returnng a single task without awaiting is more efficient.
Related
After reading pretty much every question on Stack Overflow and Microsoft's documentation about NetworkStream, I dont understand what is wrong with my code.
The problem I see is that my method GetDataAsync() hangs very often. I call this method from Init Method like so:
public MyView(string id)
{
InitializeComponent();
MyViewModel myViewModel = session.Resolve<MyViewModel>(); //Autofac
myiewModel.Init(id);
BindingContext = myViewModel;
}
Above, my View does its initialization, then resolves MyViewModel from Autofac DiC and then calls MyViewModel Init() method to do some additional setup on the VM.
The Init method then calls my Async method GetDataAsync which return a IList like so:
public void Init()
{
// call this Async method to populate a ListView
foreach (var model in GetDataAsync("111").Result)
{
// The List<MyModel> returned by the GetDataAsync is then
// used to load ListView's ObservableCollection<MyModel>
// This ObservableCollection is data-bound to a ListView in
// this View. So, the ListView shows its data once the View
// displays.
}
}
, and here is my GetDataAsync() method including my comments:
public override async Task<IList<MyModel>> GetDataAsync(string id)
{
var timeout = TimeSpan.FromSeconds(20);
try
{
byte[] messageBytes = GetMessageBytes(Id);
using (var cts = new CancellationTokenSource(timeout))
using (TcpClient client = new TcpClient(Ip, Port))
using (NetworkStream stream = client.GetStream())
{
await stream.WriteAsync(messageBytes, 0, messageBytes.Length, cts.Token);
await stream.FlushAsync(cts.Token);
byte[] buffer = new byte[1024];
StringBuilder builder = new StringBuilder();
int bytesRead = 0;
await Task.Delay(500);
while (stream.DataAvailable) // need to Delay to wait for data to be available
{
bytesRead = await stream.ReadAsync(buffer, 0, buffer.Length, cts.Token);
builder.AppendFormat("{0}", Encoding.ASCII.GetString(buffer, 0, bytesRead));
}
string msg = buffer.ToString();
}
return ParseMessageIntoList(msg); // parses message into IList<MyModel>
}
catch (OperationCanceledException oce)
{
return await Task.FromResult<IList<RoomGuestModel>>(new List<RoomGuestModel>());
}
catch (Exception ex)
{
return await Task.FromResult<IList<RoomGuestModel>>(new List<RoomGuestModel>());
}
}
I would expect that a ReadAsync or WriteAsync either complete successfully, throw some exception, or get cancelled after 10 seconds in which case I would catch OperationCanceledException.
However, it just hangs endlessly when I call method above. If I am debugging and have some breakpoints in the code above, I will be able to go through the method entirely but if I call it 2nd time, app just hangs forever.
I am new to Tasks and Async programming, so I am also not sure I do my cancellations and exception handling properly here?
UPDATE AND FIX
I figured out how to fix the deadlock issue. In hope this will help others sho might run into the same issue, I'll first explain it. The articles that helped me a lot are:
https://devblogs.microsoft.com/pfxteam/await-and-ui-and-deadlocks-oh-my/ by Stephen Taub
https://montemagno.com/c-sharp-developers-stop-calling-dot-result/ by James Montemagno
https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/jj991977.aspx by StephenCleary
https://blog.xamarin.com/getting-started-with-async-await/ by Jon Goldberger
#StephenCleary was great help understanding the issue. Calling Result or Wait (above, I call Result when calling GetDataAsync) will lead to dead-lock.
The context thread (UI in this case) is now waiting for GetDataAsync to complete, but GetDataAsync captures the current context-thread (UI thread), so it can resume on it once it gets data from TCP. But since this context-thread is now blocked by call to Result, it cannot resume.
The end result is that it looks like call to GetDataAsync has deadlocked but in reality, it is call to Result that deadlocked.
After reading tons of articles from #StephenTaub, #StephenCleary, #JamesMontemagno, #JoeGoldenberger (thank you all), I started getting understanding of the issue (I am new to TAP/async/await).
Then I discovered continuations in Tasks and how to use them to resolve the issue (thanks to Stephen Taub's article above).
So, instead of calling it like:
IList<MyModel> models = GetDataAsync("111").Result;
foeach(var model in models)
{
MyModelsObservableCollection.Add(model);
}
, I call it with continuation like this:
GetDataAsync(id)
.ContinueWith((antecedant) =>
{
foreach(var model in antecedant.Result)
{
MyModelsObservableCollection.Add(model);
}
}, TaskContinuationOptions.OnlyOnRanToCompletion)
.ContinueWith((antecedant) =>
{
var error = antecedant.Exception.Flatten();
}, TaskContinuationOptions.OnlyOnFaulted);
This seam to have fixed my deadlocking issue and now my list will load fine even though it is loaded from the constructor.
So, this seam to work just fine. But #JoeGoldenberger also suggests another solution in his article https://blog.xamarin.com/getting-started-with-async-await/ which is to use Task.Run(async()=>{...}); and inside that await GetDataAsync and load ObservableCollection. So, I gave that a try as well and that is not blocking either, so working great:
Task.Run(async() =>
{
IList<MyModel> models = await GetDataAsync(id);
foreach (var model in models)
{
MyModelsObservableCollection.Add(model);
}
});
So, it looks like either of these 2 will remove deadlock just fine. And since above my Init method is called from a c-tor; therefore, I cannot make it Async and await on this, using one of the 2 methods described above resolves my problem. I dont know which one is better but in my tests, they do work.
Your problem is most likely due to GetDataAsync("111").Result. You shouldn't block on async code.
This can cause deadocks. E.g., if you're on a UI thread, the UI thread will start GetDataAsync and run it until it hits an await. At this point, GetDataAsync returns an incomplete task, and the .Result call blocks the UI thread until that task is completed.
Eventually, the inner async call completes and GetDataAsync is ready to resume executing after its await. By default, await captures its context and resumes on that context. Which in this example is the UI thread. Which is blocked since it called Result. So, the UI thread is waiting for GetDataAsync to complete, and GetDataAsync is waiting for the UI thread so it can complete: deadlock.
The proper solution is to go async all the way; replace .Result with await, and make the necessary changes to other code for that to happen.
As stated in my update, going async all the way by providing an async lambda like below resolved the issue for me
Task.Run(async() =>
{
IList<MyModel> models = await GetDataAsync(id);
foreach (var model in models)
{
MyModelsObservableCollection.Add(model);
}
});
Loading asynchronously an observable collection in a ctor this way (in my case, ctor calls Init which then uses this Task.Run) solves problem
I'm new to async / await, and have been trying to implement it in my 4.6 web api 2 project.
public class MyController : ApiController
{
public async Task<Thing> Search(String searchTerms)
{
myThing = new Thing();
myThing.FirstProperty = await doFirstPropertyAsync(searchTerms);
myThing.SecondProperty = await doSecondPropertyAsync(searchTerms);
return myThing;
}
}
Basically I'm returning a class (Thing) that has two properties that take a few seconds each to populate. I'm actually loading maybe ~10 properties, but it's the same logic for all of them.
public async Task<MyCoolSubObject> doFirstPropertyAsync(string searchTerms)
{
SomeController sController = new SomeController();
Debug.WriteLine("first - starting.");
var x = await Task.Run(()=>sController.Lookup(searchTerms));
Debug.WriteLine("first - finishing.");
return x;
}
public async Task<MyCoolSubObject> doSecondPropertyAsync(string searchTerms)
{
SomeOtherController sController = new SomeOtherController();
Debug.WriteLine("second - starting.");
var x = await Task.Run(()=>sController.Lookup(searchTerms));
Debug.WriteLine("second - finishing.");
return x;
}
What's got my scratching my head:
When I look at the debug outputs, the first property assignment method call starts and finishes before the second completes. Again, I actually have like ten of these and no matter what order I put the property assignments in they complete in a serial fashion (ie: nothing starts until another one finishes).
These property assignments under the hood are basically doing database calls that take a while, hence I wanted them running in parallel if possible. The methods themselves ( SomeController.Lookup(string) ) contain no await/async/task stuff.
Again, I actually have like ten of these and no matter what order I
put the property assignments in they complete in a serial fashion (ie:
nothing starts until another one finishes).
This happens because in your code you use the await keyword as soon as you kickoff the task, by doing that you prevent the method to continue to execute the next statement before the task will be done.
If you want to run your tasks in parallel you should kickoff all of them and only then await all of them using Task.WhenAll:
public async Task<Thing> Search(String searchTerms)
{
myThing = new Thing();
var firstTask = doFirstPropertyAsync(searchTerms);
var secondTask = doSecondPropertyAsync(searchTerms);
await Task.WhenAll(firstTask, secondTask);
myThing.FirstProperty = await firstTask;
myThing.SecondProperty = await secondTask;
return myThing;
}
Note that when we await every task separately after we await Task.WhenAll the tasks have already been done, we do that in order to get the result from the task, although we can use the Result property (it will not block since we know the task has already been done) I prefer to use await for consistency reasons.
I want to link async method to a delegate command in prism framework in Xamarin.Forms and my question is how to do it?
Is below solution correct? Is there exist any pitfall? (deadlock, UI slow or freezing, bad practices, ...)
{ // My view model constructor
...
MyCommand = new DelegateCommand(async () => await MyJobAsync());
...
}
private async Task MyJobAsync()
{
... // Some await calls
... // Some UI element changed such as binded Observable collections
}
You can use async void directly. However, a few notes from my experience...
The structure of your code is: start asynchronous operation and then update UI with the results. This implies to me that you would be better served with a NotifyTask<T> kind of approach to asynchronous data binding, not commands. See my async MVVM data binding article for more about the design behind NotifyTask<T> (but note that the latest code has a bugfix and other enhancements).
If you really do need an asynchronous command (which is much more rare), you can use async void directly or build an async command type as I describe in my article on async MVVM commmands. I also have types to support this but the APIs for these are more in flux.
If you do choose to use async void directly:
Consider making your async Task logic public, or at least accessible to your unit tests.
Don't forget to handle exceptions properly. Just like a plain DelegateTask, any exceptions from your delegate must be properly handled.
Just have a look at this link if you're using Prism Library: https://prismlibrary.com/docs/commands/commanding.html#implementing-a-task-based-delegatecommand
In case you want to pass a CommandParameter to DelegateCommand, use in the DelegateCommand variable declaration this syntax
public DelegateCommand<object> MyCommand { get; set; }
In the constructor of the ViewModel initialize it this way:
MyCommand = new DelegateCommand<object>(HandleTap);
where HandleTap is declared as
private async void HandleTap(object param)
Hope it helps.
As has already been mentioned the way to handle async code with delegate command is to use async void. There has been a lot of discussion on this, far beyond just Prism or Xamarin Forms. The bottom line is that ICommand that both the Xamarin Forms Command and Prism DelegateCommand are limited by ICommand's void Execute(object obj). If you'd like to get more information on this I would encourage you to read the blog by Brian Lagunas explaining why DelegateCommand.FromAsync handler is obsolete.
Generally most concerns are handled very easily by updating the code. For example. I often hear complaints about Exceptions as "the reason" why FromAsync was necessary, only to see in their code they never had a try catch. Because async void is fire and forget, another complaint I've heard is that a command could execute twice. That also is easily fixed with DelegateCommands ObservesProperty and ObservesCanExecute.
I think the two main problems when calling an asynchronous method from one that executes synchronously (ICommand.Execute) are 1) denying to execute again while previous call is still running 2) handling of exceptions. Both can be tackled with an implementation like the following (prototype). This would be an async replacement for the DelegateCommand.
public sealed class AsyncDelegateCommand : ICommand
{
private readonly Func<object, Task> func;
private readonly Action<Exception> faultHandlerAction;
private int callRunning = 0;
// Pass in the async delegate (which takes an object parameter and returns a Task)
// and a delegate which handles exceptions
public AsyncDelegateCommand(Func<object, Task> func, Action<Exception> faultHandlerAction)
{
this.func = func;
this.faultHandlerAction = faultHandlerAction;
}
public bool CanExecute(object parameter)
{
return callRunning == 0;
}
public void Execute(object parameter)
{
// Replace value of callRunning with 1 if 0, otherwise return - (if already 1).
// This ensures that there is only one running call at a time.
if (Interlocked.CompareExchange(ref callRunning, 1, 0) == 1)
{
return;
}
OnCanExecuteChanged();
func(parameter).ContinueWith((task, _) => ExecuteFinished(task), null, TaskContinuationOptions.ExecuteSynchronously);
}
private void ExecuteFinished(Task task)
{
// Replace value of callRunning with 0
Interlocked.Exchange(ref callRunning, 0);
// Call error handling if task has faulted
if (task.IsFaulted)
{
faultHandlerAction(task.Exception);
}
OnCanExecuteChanged();
}
public event EventHandler CanExecuteChanged;
private void OnCanExecuteChanged()
{
// Raising this event tells for example a button to display itself as "grayed out" while async operation is still running
var handler = CanExecuteChanged;
if (handler != null) handler(this, EventArgs.Empty);
}
}
async void
I personally would avoid "async void" at all cost. It is impossible to know from the outside when the operation has finished and error handling becomes tricky. In regards to latter, for instance writing an "async Task" method which is called from an "async void" method almost needs to be aware of how its failing Task is propagated:
public async Task SomeLogic()
{
var success = await SomeFurtherLogic();
if (!success)
{
throw new DomainException(..); // Normal thing to do
}
}
And then someone writing on a different day:
public async void CommandHandler()
{
await SomeLogic(); // Calling a method. Normal thing to do but can lead to an unobserved Task exception
}
Is UI thread running DelegateCommand and background threads running await expression?
Yes, the UI thread runs the DelegateCommand. In case of an async one, it runs until the first await statement, and then resumes his regular UI thread work. If the awaiter is configured to capture the synchronization context (that is, you do not use .ConfigureAwait(false)) the UI thread will continue to run the DelegateCommand after the await.
Is UI thread running DelegateCommand and background threads running await expression?
Whether the "await expression" runs on a background thread, foreground thread, a threadpool thread or whatever depends on the api you call. For example, you can push cpu-bound work to the threadpool using Task.Run or you can wait for an i/o-operation without using any thread at all with methods like Stream.ReadAsync
public ICommand MyCommand{get;set;}
//constructor
public ctor()
{
MyCommand = new Xamarin.Forms.Command(CmdDoTheJob);
}
public async void DoTheJob()
{
await TheMethod();
}
public DelegateCommand MyCommand => new DelegateCommand(MyMethod);
private async void MyMethod()
{
}
There are no pitfalls. A void return type in async method was created especially for delegates. If you want to change something, that has reflected on UI, insert relevant code in this block:
Device.BeginOnMainThread(()=>
{
your code;
});
Actually, ICommand and DelegateCommand pretty similar, so an above answer is quite right.
I have a MassTransitStateMachine that orchestrates a process which involves creating multiple events.
Once all of the events are done, I want the state to transition to a 'clean up' phase.
Here is the relevant state declaration and filter function:
During(ImportingData,
When(DataImported)
// When we get a data imported event, mark this source as done.
.Then(MarkImportCompletedForLocation),
When(DataImported, IsAllDataImported)
// Once all are done, we can transition to cleaning up...
.Then(CleanUpSources)
.TransitionTo(CleaningUp)
);
...snip...
private static bool IsAllDataImported(EventContext<DataImportSagaState, DataImportMappingCompletedEvent> ctx)
{
return ctx.Instance.Locations.Values.All(x => x);
}
So while the state is ImportingData, I expect to receive multiple DataImported events. Each event marks its location as done so that that IsAllDataImported method can determine if we should transition to the next state.
However, if the last two DataImported events arrive at the same time, the handler for transitioning to the CleaningUp phase fires twice, and I end up trying to perform the clean up twice.
I could solve this in my own code, but I was expecting the state machine to manage this. Am I doing something wrong, or do I just need to handle the contention myself?
The solution proposed by Chris won't work in my situation because I have multiple events of the same type arriving. I need to transition only when all of those events have arrived. The CompositeEvent construct doesn't work for this use case.
My solution to this was to raise a new AllDataImported event during the MarkImportCompletedForLocation method. This method now handles determining whether all sub-imports are complete in a thread safe way.
So my state machine definition is:
During(ImportingData,
When(DataImported)
// When we get a data imported event, mark the URI in the locations list as done.
.Then(MarkImportCompletedForLocation),
When(AllDataImported)
// Once all are done, we can transition to cleaning up...
.TransitionTo(CleaningUp)
.Then(CleanUpSources)
);
The IsAllDataImported method is no longer needed as a filter.
The saga state has a Locations property:
public Dictionary<Uri, bool> Locations { get; set; }
And the MarkImportCompletedForLocation method is defined as follows:
private void MarkImportCompletedForLocation(BehaviorContext<DataImportSagaState, DataImportedEvent> ctx)
{
lock (ctx.Instance.Locations)
{
ctx.Instance.Locations[ctx.Data.ImportSource] = true;
if (ctx.Instance.Locations.Values.All(x => x))
{
var allDataImported = new AllDataImportedEvent {CorrelationId = ctx.Instance.CorrelationId};
this.CreateEventLift(AllDataImported).Raise(ctx.Instance, allDataImported);
}
}
}
(I've just written this so that I understand how the general flow will work; I recognise that the MarkImportCompletedForLocation method needs to be more defensive by verifying that keys exist in the dictionary.)
You can use a composite event to accumulate multiple events into a subsequent event that fires when the dependent events have fired. This is defined using:
CompositeEvent(() => AllDataImported, x => x.ImportStatus, DataImported, MoreDataImported);
During(ImportingData,
When(DataImported)
.Then(context => { do something with data }),
When(MoreDataImported)
.Then(context => { do smoething with more data}),
When(AllDataImported)
.Then(context => { okay, have all data now}));
Then, in your state machine state instance:
class DataImportSagaState :
SagaStateMachineInstance
{
public int ImportStatus { get; set; }
}
This should address the problem you are trying to solve, so give it a shot. Note that event order doesn't matter, they can arrive in any order as the state of which events have been received is in the ImportStatus property of the instance.
The data of the individual events is not saved, so you'll need to capture that into the state instance yourself using .Then() methods.
We have a Windows Phone 7 application which uses a set of 3 service methods using Reactive Extensions, defined as follows:
public static class ServiceClient
{
public static IObservable<string> LookupImage(byte[] image) {...}
public static IObservable<XDocument> GetDefinition(string id) {...}
public static IObservable<Dictionary<string, byte[]>> GetFiles(string id, string[] fileNames) {...}
}
We need the WP7 application to keep calling LookupImage in the above client (each time with different set of byte[] image data) until the returned IObservable<string> is nonempty. After we get the Observable string we have to call GetDefinition and GetFiles methods (in that order).
The calls to LookupImage should happen as often as the service response is returned as opposed to being controlled by a timer as it will vary depending on network connection speed and we need to be able to send as many of these as possible.
I'd appreciate any pointers to what might be a solution to the above. As a start I have the following
private void RunLookupAndRenderLogic()
{
byte[] imageBytes = GetImageBytes();
// There are some cases where the image was not 'interesting' enough in which case GetImageBytes() returns null
if (pictureBytes != null)
{
// Where we have image data, send this to LookupImage service method
var markerLookup = ServiceClient.LookupImage(imageBytes);
markerLookup.Subscribe(id =>
{
// If the id is empty, we need to call this again.
if (String.IsNullOrEmpty(id))
{
???
}
// If we have an id, call GetDefinition and GetFiles methods of the service. No further calls to LookupImage should take place.
RenderLogic(id);
});
}
else
// If no interesting image was returned, try again
RunRecognitionAndRenderLogic();
}
Apologies if I get this wrong, but if I understand it correctly you want to Retry the call to LookupImage with the exact same argument, until it returns a value?
A naive way of solving this would be to simply call repeat and then take(1):
ServiceClient.LookupImage(imageBytes)
.Repeat()
.Take(1)
.Subscribe(id => ....);
However as Rx is single threaded by default, there is no point in this context that allows us to inject our disposal call (implicit from the Take(1)-->OnComplete()-->Auto disposal of subscription).
You can dodge this by offering some breathing space between subsequent re-subscriptions by using the CurrentThread Scheduler.
Observable.Defer(()=>
ServiceClient.LookupImage(imageBytes)
.ObserveOn(Scheduler.CurrentThread)
)
.Repeat()
.Take(1)
.Subscribe(id => ....);
There are other ways of achieving this with some good understanding of Rx and some creativity. (Most I would imagine a Scheduler)
To give you some inspriation check out the chapter on Scheduling and Threading. It covers recursion and building your own iterator which is effectively what you are trying to do.
Full code sample:
private void RunLookupAndRenderLogic()
{
byte[] imageBytes = GetImageBytes();
// There are some cases where the image was not 'interesting' enough in which case GetImageBytes() returns null
if (pictureBytes != null)
{
// Where we have image data, send this to LookupImage service method
var subscription = Observable
.Defer(()=>
ServiceClient.LookupImage(imageBytes)
.ObserveOn(Scheduler.CurrentThread)
)
.Where(id=>!String.IsNullOrEmpty(id))
.Repeat()
.Take(1)
.Subscribe(id =>
{
// If we have an id, call GetDefinition and GetFiles methods of the service. No further calls to LookupImage should take place.
RenderLogic(id);
});
//TODO: You dont offer any way to cancel this (dispose of the suscription).
//This means you could loop forever :-(
}
else
{
// If no interesting image was returned, try again
RunRecognitionAndRenderLogic();
}
}
(Disclosure: I am the author of IntroToRx.com)