Thrift client-server multiple roles - c++

this is my first question, so sorry if the form is wrong!
I'm trying to make thrift server (python) and client (c++).
However I need to exchange messages in both direction. Client should register (call server's function and wait), and server should listen on same port for N (N-> 100k) incoming connections (clients). After some conditions are satisfied, server needs to call functions on each client and collect results and interpret them.
I'm little confused, and first questions is "can this be done in Thrift"?
Second question is related to mechanism that will allow me bidirectional communication. I guess that I will need two services. One with client's functions other with server's.
But I'm confused with calling code. I understand one way communication (calling functions from server), but with calling functions from client side I have a problem.
Any suggestions???
Thanks!

Consider using boost::asio for your client side, though depending on your level of C++, the code may seem too dense.
If you're looking for a simple example, take a look at:
http://www.linuxhowtos.org/C_C++/socket.htm
It contains both server-side and client-side code. Both sides create a socket and two-way communication is achieved by each side posting data to the socket. The server side is generally multi-threaded (with one thread per connection). The client side can be implemented as a single-threaded loop that alternates between querying the socket for any incoming information, performing computations, and posting results back to the socket.

Since, you say you are having problem with calling functions from client side, here is a sample Thrift code with Java server and C++ client, where the client calls a function in server. http://fundoonick.blogspot.com/2010/06/sample-thrift-program-for-server-in.html
Hope this helps :)

Related

Can a WinHTTP server handle clients in seperate thread just like Winsock

Objective
I'm writing an HTTP server in C++17.
For the sake of the discussion, I reduce the requirements to:
Simple HTTP Echo Server.
Expects multiple clients.
Clients constantly send simple GET requests.
Handle each client in a separate thread.
Respond by 200 OK
Winsock
I read this example: Winsock Server Source Code.
I understand how to adjust this example to answer the requirements (similar to what was suggested here):
Create a std::thread that listen for clients
When a client is accepted, create a new thread for the client and pass the new SOCKET.
WinHTTP
I also want to experiment with WinHTTP as well. So, I read this: HTTP Server Sample Application
.
But, I got a bit lost trying to apply the same "tactic" as before. There is no equivalent WinHTTP function to Winsock's accept() function that will allow me to create a thread per client.
Question
Assuming the approach I intend to apply in Winsock is valid, is there a similar approach to make WinHTTP handle each connection/client in a separate thread?

Design a multi client - server application, where client send messages infrequent

I have to design a server which can able to send a same objects to many clients. clients may send some request to the server if it wants to update something in the database.
Things which are confusing:
My server should start the program (where I perform some operation and produce 'results' , this will be send to the client).
My server should listen to the incoming connection from the client, if any it should accept and start sending the ‘results’.
Server should accept as many clients as possible (Not more than 100).
My ‘result' should be secured. I don’t want some one take my ‘result' and see what my program logics look like.
I thought point 1. is one thread. And point 2. is another thread and it going to create multiple threads within its scope to serve point 3. Point 4 should be taken by my application logic while serialising the 'result' rather the server.
Is it a bad idea? If so where can i improve?
Thanks
Putting every connection on a thread is very bad, and is apparently a common mistake that beginners do. Every thread costs about 1 MB of memory, and this will overkill your program for no good reason. I did ask the very same question before, and I got a very good answer. I used boost ASIO, and the server/client project is finished since months, and it's a running project now beautifully.
If you use C++ and SSL (to secure your connection), no one will see your logic, since your programs are compiled. But you have to write your own communication protocol/serialization in that case.

websocket++ using fastcgi++'s session example

I'm brand new to c++ and know next to nothing about web protocols or websockets, so this may seem ridiculous.
I make websites that are 100% ajax and want to incorporate websockets. Fastcgi++ is everything I could hope for for the ajax demands, but it doesn't have websockets, and I chose websocket++ over libwebsockets since websocket++ is more or less a simple #include, so I assumed that I could incorporate it into fastcgi++.
I think I've figured out fastcgi++, and it looks like most of the action happens in Fastcgipp::Request then Fastcgipp::Http::Sessions for session data http://www.nongnu.org/fastcgipp/doc/2.1/a00005.html; however, I think I have to do the same thing with websocket++'s server::handler for handling the websocket https://github.com/zaphoyd/websocketpp/wiki/Creating-Applications-using-WebSocket--, and now I'm lost at sea.
Enter my complete inexperience with c++: I think I have to use virtual inheritance, but I have no idea. Also, if I could even properly "subclass" both, how do I make sure that they don't run over each other?
Please show me a basic example of how websocket++ can use fastcgi++'s session management.
A WebSocket connection cannot be processed by an HTTP request/response workflow. In order to use something like fastcgi++ with both regular HTTP requests and with WebSocket requests it would need to have some way of recognizing a WebSocket handshake and piping that off to another handler instead of processing it as HTTP. I don't see an obvious pass through mode of that sort in its documentation, but I could be missing something.
If such a feature exists, WebSocket++ can be used in stream mode where it disables all of its network elements and just processes streams of bytes piped in from another networking library.
Some alternatives:
WebSocket++ supports HTTP pass through. This is essentially the opposite of what is described above. WebSocket++ would be used as the networking layer. It would process incoming WebSocket connections and would pass off HTTP requests to some other subsystem.
WebSocket++ and fastcgi++ could be run on different ports or different hostnames. This could be done in the same program or separate programs. With client side requests directed to the appropriate host/port.
Disclaimer: I am the author of WebSocket++

C++ TCP server Class Design

I am developing TCP server in C++(win32/linux) which cater multiple client.The server is for Video Streaming.Client request video to server and Server get it from Gateway connected with camera.
I am stuck up in the class Design.I found three classes by
Peer
Session and
ConnectionMgr.
So here ConnectionMgr is responsible for managing other Classes.
I wanted your feedback on this.
what info Peer and session need to have;
How Peer and session is related
what information needs to be modeled here.
how to do Session maintainer.
Managing multiple client will require Threads what information thoses may need.
Please give your feedback so that I can upgrade my design.
Looking at the problem space from scratch:
there's some state associated with each client that connects - you seem to split this between Peer and Session and I see no real value in that if they're 1:1 - can omit such trivia from the high-level design stage.
"what info Peer and session need to have": socket descriptor is the only crucial thing, assuming you have only one camera and stream to all clients at the same pace (losing data when socket send() blocks/can't complete due to full buffer), otherwise, a buffer too...
you have a ConnectionMgr, well - yes... it must listen and accept clients on the server socket, possibly launch a new thread per client or monitor the set of current client connections and dispatch events
you'll need to make some decisions about the I/O and concurrency model (e.g. select/poll/non-blocking, async, blocking, single threaded, thread-per-client, thread-pool etc)
this will obviously affect your design: you should decide which - or which choices - you need to support...
To get a feel for this problem space, I suggest you create a very simple client/server program - probably using threads if you're familiar and comfortable with multithreading, otherwise you can hack upon the GCC libc TCP client/server examples for a select() based solution (http://www.gnu.org/s/libc/manual/html_node/Server-Example.html#Server-Example) or try boost::asio or ACE or whatever. To start, just get it working so you can telnet to the server and whatever you type in any connection is echoed out on all the connections. That should give you enough insight to start asking more concrete questions.
As #nabulke and #Jan Hudec stated in their comments, Boost.Asio is very good solution for your problem. Have a look at pretty simple example "Async TCP Echo Server". It uses just 2 classes: server and session. No session_manager. Sessions are managed automatically by smart pointers, very convenient and simple approach.
Using Boost.Asio you can keep the network part simple (and almost optimal by efficiency using asynchronous processing). As a bonus, adding couple of code lines, you receive multithreaded server w/o headache (I would recommend this example: "An HTTP server using a single io_service and a thread pool calling io_service::run().", just ignore HTTP stuff. pay attention to boost::asio::io_service::strand used in connection class)

Client and server

I would like to create a connection between two applications. Should I be using Client-Server or is there another way of efficiently communicating between one another? Is there any premade C++ networking client server libraries which are easy to use/reuse and implement?
Application #1 <---> (Client) <---> (Server) <---> Application #2
Thanks!
Client / server is a generic architecture pattern (much like factory, delegation, inheritance, bridge are design patterns). What you probably want is a library to eliminate the tedium of packing and unpacking your data in a format that can be sent over the wire. I strongly recommend you take a look at the protocol buffers library, which is used extensively at Google and released as open source. It will automatically encode / decode data, and it makes it possible for programs written in different languages to send and receive messages of the same type with all the dirty work done for you automatically. Protobuf only deals with encoding, not actually sending and receiving. For that, you can use primitive sockets (strongly recommend against that) or the Boost.Asio asynchronous I/O library.
I should add that you seem to be confused about the meaning of client and server, since in your diagram you have the application talking to a client which talks to a server which talks to another application. This is wrong. Your application is the client (or the server). Client / server is simply a role that your application takes on during the communication. An application is considered to be a client when it initiates a connection or a request, while an application is considered to be a server when it waits for and processes incoming requests. Client / server are simply terms to describe application behavior.
If you know the applications will be running on the same machine, you can use sockets, message queues, pipes, or shared memory. Which option you choose depends on a lot of factors.
There is a ton of example code for any of these strategies as well as libraries that will abstract away a lot of the details.
If they are running on different machines, you will want to communicate through sockets.
There's a tutorial here, with decent code samples.