Java: Multiple threads vs. sockets - java

I've written a simple application in Java where there are two nodes, each with a ServerSocket open to a port listening for incoming connections. The nodes run two threads each, sending 1000 messages to the other node through a persistent TCP socket created when sending the first message. However, the nodes do not receive all 1000 messages. One may receive 850 while the other only receives 650. This number tends to stay constant over multiple runs.
The sending code is as follows:
public void SendMsg(String dest, Message myMsg) {
Socket sendsock = null;
PrintWriter printwr = null;
try {
if(printwr == null) {
sendsock = new Socket(dest, Main.rcvport);
printwr = new PrintWriter(sendsock.getOutputStream(), true);
}
String msgtosend = myMsg.msgtype.toString() + "=" + Main.myaddy + "=" + myMsg.content + "\n";
printwr.print(msgtosend);
} catch (UnknownHostException ex) {
System.out.println(ex);
//DO: Terminate or restart
} catch (IOException ex) {
System.out.println(ex);
//DO: Terminate or restart
}
}
Performance seems to improve if I use
buffwr = new BufferedWriter(printwr)
as well and use buffwr.write(...) instead of printwr.print(...), though it doesn't seem to be a complete solution for the data loss. There are no exceptions to show that packets weren't delivered, so according to the sender, they were all sent successfully.
On the receiving end, the accepted connection is treated as follows:
BufferedReader inbuff = new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(incoming.getInputStream()));
while(running) {
String rcvedln = inbuff.readLine();
if(rcvedln != null) {
count++;
System.out.println(count);
}
}
Is there an problem with how the readers and writers have been used that could be causing the problem? Thanks.

SendMsg() is creating a new socket every call, so you aren't using a persistent TCP connection. The method isn't closing the socket, either, so you have a lot of open collections. You may be reaching a limit to the number of connections the process can make (the sockets may not be closed when the objects are garbage collected).
Finally, as kd304 pointed out, the Javadoc for PrintWriter states this about the autoFlush parameter of the PrintWriter constructor: "if true, the println, printf, or format methods will flush the output buffer". Your code wasn't calling a method that did a flush.
Try this:
public class MessageSender implements Closeable {
private final Socket socket;
private final PrintWriter writer;
public MessageSender(String dest, int port) {
socket = new Socket(dest, port);
writer = new PrintWriter(socket.getOutputStream(), true);
}
public void sendMessage(Message message) {
try {
writer.println(message.toString());
} catch (UnknownHostException ex) {
System.out.println(ex);
//DO: Terminate or restart
} catch (IOException ex) {
System.out.println(ex);
//DO: Terminate or restart
}
}
#Override
public void close() throws IOException {
writer.close();
socket.close();
}
Note I modified the code so that sendMessage() calls Message.toString() to get the formatted message. It doesn't seem right for sendMessage() to reference fields in Message in order to format the message. Instead of using toString() you could create a method in Message specifically for this purpose.
Here's the server side code:
public class Server implements Runnable {
private final ServerSocket serverSocket;
private final ExecutorService executor;
private volatile boolean running = true;
public Server(int port, ExecutorService executor) throws IOException {
serverSocket = new ServerSocket(port);
this.executor = executor;
}
#Override
public void run() throws IOExeption {
while (running) {
Socket socket = serverSocket.accept();
executor.execute(new ConnectionHandler(socket));
}
}
public boolean stop(long timeout, TimeUnit unit) {
running = false;
executor.shutdown();
return executor.awaitTermination(timeout, unit);
}
}
You can use Executors to create an ExecutorService to run the tasks. Note that ConnectionHandler needs to close the socket it is given.

Are you closing out the PrintWriter to flush the stream?
} finally {
printwr.close();
sendsock.close();
}

Ah, sorry. I accidentally removed the commenting from the code. It's actually like this:
public void SendMsg(String dest, Message myMsg) {
Socket sendsock = null;
try {
if(printwr == null) {
sendsock = new Socket(dest, Main.rcvport);
printwr = new PrintWriter(sendsock.getOutputStream(), true);
}
String msgtosend = myMsg.msgtype.toString() + "=" + Main.myaddy + "=" + myMsg.content + "\n";
printwr.print(msgtosend);
} catch (UnknownHostException ex) {
System.out.println(ex);
//DO: Terminate or restart
} catch (IOException ex) {
System.out.println(ex);
//DO: Terminate or restart
}
}
printrw is declared and stored outside the function, so once it's set up, there is no need for sendsock or for reinitializing printrw. In the actual application, I'm storing the PrintWriter for every connection in a HashMap and retrieving it at the start of the SendMsg(...) function.
Since the connections are persistent, every time one is accepted, a new thread is lunch that runs a while loop to check it continuously for data. These threads and connections are only closed once the application is terminated. In addition to my previous question, is there a more efficient way of doing this?
Earlier, I'd implemented this code without the "\n" and using println(...) instead and I still had the issue of some messages not being received, so I'm not sure what is causing the problem. The messages are sent like so:
public class SendPortal2 implements Runnable {
String dest = null;
SendPortal2 (String dest) {
this.dest = dest;
}
public void run() {
for(int i=1; i<1000; i+=2) {
Message myMsg = new Message("Message", Main.myaddy + " " + String.valueOf(i));
Main.myCommMgr.SendMsg(dest, myMsg);
}
}
}
There are two such threads running. When I ran the code again just now, one side got 999 packets whereas the other one only got 500, leading me to believe sometimes the data from an entire thread could be blocked out. Is that likely?
Thanks for the replies!

If I put a Thread.sleep(2) inside the for loop where the SendMsg function is called, more messages are received properly, but it's not always 1000. Could it be possible that the system's resources are being hogged by two threads running while loops continuously?

Related

Edit a variable from a thread

I am working on a simple project: Server executes a slave (ReaderF Class) inside a thread that reads a file and then extracts its content and saves it inside the Server himself. The server then needs to execute a pool to send the content to a client when he connects. I started by writing the ReaderF to extract the content. Problem: it never edits the String variable in which he is supposed to stock the content. Here is what I did:
public class Serveur {
private ServerSocket serverSocket;
private Socket socket;
public String res=null; //This is what my thread is supposed to be editing
ExecutorService pool = null;
public static final int port = 33333;
Serveur(int port, int size){
try {
pool = Executors.newFixedThreadPool(5);
serverSocket = new ServerSocket(port, size);
} catch (IOException ex) {
Logger.getLogger(Serveur.class.getName()).log(Level.SEVERE, null, ex);
}
}
void manage () throws IOException {
while(true) {
ReaderF S = null;
try {
S = new ReaderF(serverSocket.accept(), this);
} catch (IOException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
Thread t=new Thread(S);
t.start();
}
}
And this is the slave that reads and edit the res variable.
public class ReaderF implements Runnable {
private final Socket socket;
private Serveur serverMaitre;
ReaderF(Socket socket, Serveur serverMaitre) {
this.socket = socket;
this.serverMaitre = serverMaitre;
}
public void run() {
String fileName = "/home/abdou/1.txt";
FileReader fileReader = null;
Writer output =null;
try {
fileReader = new FileReader(fileName);
} catch (FileNotFoundException e) {
// TODO Auto-generated catch block
e.printStackTrace();
}
try (BufferedReader bufferedReader = new BufferedReader(fileReader)) {
output = new OutputStreamWriter(socket.getOutputStream(), "8859_1");
String line;
String res="";
while((line = bufferedReader.readLine()) != null) {
res+=line+"\n";
}
serverMaitre.res=res; // This is where i tell him to edit res inside the server
socket.close();
} catch (IOException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
When I execute this main I see nothing on the screen. I know that it is due to the fact that the Server is stuck in the while loop.
public class Main{
public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException {
Serveur serveur = new Serveur(Serveur.port, 1);
serveur.manage();
System.out.println("The res variable content is"+serveur.res);
}}
How would I get out of it please. And Is my thread really changing the res variable ? Thank you
When multiple threads work with the same variables, then they are allowed to work on a local copy of the variable (in their stack) instead of the original variable (in the heap). This means that one thread may not see changes to a variable that another thread did (he is not 'refreshing' its local data), or the other thread is not 'publishing' (technical term: flushing) the updated value. So, when your ReaderF assign a value to 'res', the main thread (which is checking it) might not notice this. Solution: Make the variable volatile:
public volatile String res=null;
This forces the ReaderF to flush the updated value after assigning, and the main thread to refresh it when reading it.
But you might have another problem here, because you have multiple threads that may be all writing the 'res' variable (Depends on how active your socket is). You can get 'lost updates' or other 'race conditions' here. So maybe you even need a synchronized somewhere. But it would be too much to explain Multi-Threading here. Please google about it. Multi-Threading is not trivial unfortunately, you cannot just make new threads as you wish and expect everything to work. And adding a volatile is not the solution most of the time. It might just be enough for what you wanna do here.

Handle incoming sockets in another thread

I'm trying to do something potentially stupid, but I reckon it's a good idea, so bear with me. I tried to implement it, but I hit an awkward issue with sockets closing between threads - so I want some fresh eyes on the case.
Scenario
I want to write an object from a Client to a Server via sockets. There may be more than one Client communicating with the Server concurrently.
The object, a Message, is handled by the Server through its handling mechanisms. It is proposed that instead of the Server's main thread looking out for new incoming connections, a Listener thread is set up. Once it spots an incoming connection, it alerts the Server, storing the socket in a queue without receiving the data, so it can go back to listening quickly.
In its own time, the Server picks up the waiting socket, spawns a new thread, reads the Message, and closes the socket.
The code
Here's my first thoughts on how this should be implemented. There is a fundamental flaw in it which I will explain below.
Ignore the use of public fields - I'm just trying to make the code short for you guys
public class Server {
public boolean messageWaiting = false;
public static void main(String[] args) {
new Server().run();
}
public void run() {
Listener l = new Listener();
l.listen(this);
try {
while (true) {
System.out.println("I'm happily doing my business!");
Thread.sleep(1000);
if (messageWaiting) {
acceptMessages(l);
}
}
} catch (InterruptedException die) {}
}
private void acceptMessages(Listener l) {
while (!l.waiting.isEmpty()) {
try (
Socket client = l.waiting.poll();
ObjectInputStream ois = new ObjectInputStream(client.getInputStream())
) {
// Handle messages in new threads! (or a thread pool)
new Thread() {
public void run() {
try {
System.out.println(ois.readObject());
} catch (Exception ex) {
ex.printStackTrace();
}
}
}.start();
} catch (Exception ex) {
// Oh no! The socket has already been closed!
ex.printStackTrace();
}
}
}
}
public class Listener {
public ConcurrentLinkedQueue<Socket> waiting = new ConcurrentLinkedQueue<>();
public void listen(final Server callback) {
new Thread() {
public void run() {
try (ServerSocket rxSock = new ServerSocket(7500)) {
while (!isInterrupted()) {
try (Socket client = rxSock.accept()) {
// Once a new socket arrives, add it to the waiting queue
waiting.add(client);
// Alert the server
callback.messageWaiting = true;
} catch (IOException ex) {
ex.printStackTrace();
}
}
} catch (IOException ex) {
ex.printStackTrace();
}
}
}.start();
}
}
public class Client {
public static void main(String[] args) {
try (
Socket txSock = new Socket(InetAddress.getLoopbackAddress(), 7500);
ObjectOutputStream oos = new ObjectOutputStream(txSock.getOutputStream())
) {
oos.writeObject("This is a Message, trust me.");
} catch (IOException ex) {
ex.printStackTrace();
}
}
}
What's wrong with this?
This:
I'm happily doing my business!
I'm happily doing my business!
java.net.SocketException: Socket is closed
at java.net.Socket.getInputStream(Unknown Source)
at Server.acceptMessages(Server.java:30)
at Server.run(Server.java:20)
at Server.main(Server.java:9)
This is because the Java 7 try blocks I'm using close the sockets once they're finished. So why don't I do this manually? Try yourself - you end up with a warning saying you're only ever going to call close() on a null object!
So, how do I avoid the whole issue of my incoming socket being closed before the Server thread picks up on it? Or is this a bad idea anyway and I should do something else?
Your statement in Listener
try (Socket client = rxSock.accept()) { ...
Is a try-with-resources for the client socket. As soon as you add it to the queue and exit the try block, the socket gets auto-closed.

stop thread with udp server

I've got an UDP server class which implements Runnable interface. I start it in the thread.
The problem is that I can't stop it. Even in Debug it stops on pt.join() method.
Here is my server class
import java.io.IOException;
import java.net.DatagramPacket;
import java.net.DatagramSocket;
import java.net.SocketException;
public class Network implements Runnable {
final int port = 6789;
DatagramSocket socket;
byte[] input = new byte[1024];
byte[] output = new byte[1024];
public Network() throws SocketException{
socket = new DatagramSocket(6789);
}
#Override
public void run() {
while(true){
DatagramPacket pack = new DatagramPacket(input,input.length);
try {
socket.receive(pack);
} catch (IOException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
input = pack.getData();
System.out.println(new String(input));
output = "Server answer".getBytes();
DatagramPacket sendpack = new DatagramPacket(output,output.length,pack.getAddress(),pack.getPort());
try {
socket.send(sendpack);
} catch (IOException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
}
}
This is the main class
public class Main {
static Network network = null;
public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException{
network = new Network();
System.out.println("Try to start server");
Thread pt = new Thread(network);
pt.start();
pt.interrupt();
try {
pt.join();
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
System.out.println("Stop server");
}
}
How to stop server?
java.net reads are non-interruptible. You would have to either close the DatagramSocket or have it read with a timeout (setSoTimeout()), and when you get the resulting SocketTimeoutException check the interrupt status: if set, exit the thread.
Calling interrupt doesn't actually stop the thread, it just sets a flag.
Inside your loop, check for isInterrupted(). e.g., a quick and dirty way would be change
while(true)
to
while (!Thread.currentThread().isInterrupted())
But you should consult some more documentation if you get more serious about this project.
As mentioned by #EJP, if you are hanging in the Socket IO, you'll need to close the Socket or have a timeout.
In addition to what EJP said, you probably should have a local boolean called running (or whatever), and set it to true before you enter your while loop. Have your while loop be conditioned on this local boolean. And provide methods (stopServer() and isRunning()) to set and check the status of the boolean. You also might want to remove the try-catch from inside the while loop and put the entire while loop within a try-catch-finally and in the finally statement perform clean-up (set running=false; close the connection, etc)

How can I interrupt a ServerSocket accept() method?

In my main thread I have a while(listening) loop which calls accept() on my ServerSocket object, then starts a new client thread and adds it to a Collection when a new client is accepted.
I also have an Admin thread which I want to use to issue commands, like 'exit', which will cause all the client threads to be shut down, shut itself down, and shut down the main thread, by turning listening to false.
However, the accept() call in the while(listening) loop blocks, and there doesn't seem to be any way to interrupt it, so the while condition cannot be checked again and the program cannot exit!
Is there a better way to do this? Or some way to interrupt the blocking method?
You can call close() from another thread, and the accept() call will throw a SocketException.
Set timeout on accept(), then the call will timeout the blocking after specified time:
http://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/api/java/net/SocketOptions.html#SO_TIMEOUT
Set a timeout on blocking Socket operations:
ServerSocket.accept();
SocketInputStream.read();
DatagramSocket.receive();
The option must be set prior to entering a blocking operation to take effect. If the timeout expires and the operation would continue to block, java.io.InterruptedIOException is raised. The Socket is not closed in this case.
Is calling close() on the ServerSocket an option?
http://java.sun.com/j2se/6/docs/api/java/net/ServerSocket.html#close%28%29
Closes this socket. Any thread currently blocked in accept() will throw a SocketException.
You can just create "void" socket for break serversocket.accept()
Server side
private static final byte END_WAITING = 66;
private static final byte CONNECT_REQUEST = 1;
while (true) {
Socket clientSock = serverSocket.accept();
int code = clientSock.getInputStream().read();
if (code == END_WAITING
/*&& clientSock.getInetAddress().getHostAddress().equals(myIp)*/) {
// End waiting clients code detected
break;
} else if (code == CONNECT_REQUEST) { // other action
// ...
}
}
Method for break server cycle
void acceptClients() {
try {
Socket s = new Socket(myIp, PORT);
s.getOutputStream().write(END_WAITING);
s.getOutputStream().flush();
s.close();
} catch (IOException e) {
}
}
The reason ServerSocket.close() throws an exception
is because you have an outputstream or an inputstream
attached to that socket.
You can avoid this exception safely by first closing the input and output streams.
Then try closing the ServerSocket.
Here is an example:
void closeServer() throws IOException {
try {
if (outputstream != null)
outputstream.close();
if (inputstream != null)
inputstream.close();
} catch (IOException e1) {
e1.printStackTrace();
}
if (!serversock.isClosed())
serversock.close();
}
}
You can call this method to close any socket from anywhere without getting an exception.
Use serverSocket.setSoTimeout(timeoutInMillis).
OK, I got this working in a way that addresses the OP's question more directly.
Keep reading past the short answer for a Thread example of how I use this.
Short answer:
ServerSocket myServer;
Socket clientSocket;
try {
myServer = new ServerSocket(port)
myServer.setSoTimeout(2000);
//YOU MUST DO THIS ANYTIME TO ASSIGN new ServerSocket() to myServer‼!
clientSocket = myServer.accept();
//In this case, after 2 seconds the below interruption will be thrown
}
catch (java.io.InterruptedIOException e) {
/* This is where you handle the timeout. THIS WILL NOT stop
the running of your code unless you issue a break; so you
can do whatever you need to do here to handle whatever you
want to happen when the timeout occurs.
*/
}
Real world example:
In this example, I have a ServerSocket waiting for a connection inside a Thread. When I close the app, I want to shut down the thread (more specifically, the socket) in a clean manner before I let the app close, so I use the .setSoTimeout() on the ServerSocket then I use the interrupt that is thrown after the timeout to check and see if the parent is trying to shut down the thread. If so, then I set close the socket, then set a flag indicating that the thread is done, then I break out of the Threads loop which returns a null.
package MyServer;
import javafx.concurrent.Task;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.net.ServerSocket;
import java.net.Socket;
import java.net.SocketException;
import javafx.concurrent.Task;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.net.ServerSocket;
import java.net.Socket;
import java.net.SocketException;
public class Server {
public Server (int port) {this.port = port;}
private boolean threadDone = false;
private boolean threadInterrupted = false;
private boolean threadRunning = false;
private ServerSocket myServer = null;
private Socket clientSocket = null;
private Thread serverThread = null;;
private int port;
private static final int SO_TIMEOUT = 5000; //5 seconds
public void startServer() {
if (!threadRunning) {
serverThread = new Thread(thisServerTask);
serverThread.setDaemon(true);
serverThread.start();
}
}
public void stopServer() {
if (threadRunning) {
threadInterrupted = true;
while (!threadDone) {
//We are just waiting for the timeout to exception happen
}
if (threadDone) {threadRunning = false;}
}
}
public boolean isRunning() {return threadRunning;}
private Task<Void> thisServerTask = new Task <Void>() {
#Override public Void call() throws InterruptedException {
threadRunning = true;
try {
myServer = new ServerSocket(port);
myServer.setSoTimeout(SO_TIMEOUT);
clientSocket = new Socket();
} catch (IOException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
while(true) {
try {
clientSocket = myServer.accept();
}
catch (java.io.InterruptedIOException e) {
if (threadInterrupted) {
try { clientSocket.close(); } //This is the clean exit I'm after.
catch (IOException e1) { e1.printStackTrace(); }
threadDone = true;
break;
}
} catch (SocketException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
} catch (IOException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
return null;
}
};
}
Then, in my Controller class ... (I will only show relevant code, massage it into your own code as needed)
public class Controller {
Server server = null;
private static final int port = 10000;
private void stopTheServer() {
server.stopServer();
while (server.isRunning() {
//We just wait for the server service to stop.
}
}
#FXML private void initialize() {
Platform.runLater(()-> {
server = new Server(port);
server.startServer();
Stage stage = (Stage) serverStatusLabel.getScene().getWindow();
stage.setOnCloseRequest(event->stopTheServer());
});
}
}
I hope this helps someone down the road.
Another thing you can try which is cleaner, is to check a flag in the accept loop, and then when your admin thread wants to kill the thread blocking on the accept, set the flag (make it thread safe) and then make a client socket connection to the listening socket.
The accept will stop blocking and return the new socket.
You can work out some simple protocol thing telling the listening thread to exit the thread cleanly.
And then close the socket on the client side.
No exceptions, much cleaner.
You can simply pass the timeout limit (milli seconds) as a parameter while calling accept function.
eg serverSocket.accept(1000);
automatically close the request after 1 sec

Java: Multithreading & UDP Socket Programming

I am new to multithreading & socket programming in Java. I would like to know what is the best way to implement 2 threads - one for receiving a socket and one for sending a socket. If what I am trying to do sounds absurd, pls let me know why! The code is largely inspired from Sun's tutorials online.I want to use Multicast sockets so that I can work with a multicast group.
class Server extends Thread
{
static protected MulticastSocket socket = null;
protected BufferedReader in = null;
public InetAddress group;
private static class Receive implements Runnable
{
public void run()
{
try
{
byte[] buf = new byte[256];
DatagramPacket pkt = new DatagramPacket(buf,buf.length);
socket.receive(pkt);
String received = new String(pkt.getData(),0,pkt.getLength());
System.out.println("From server#" + received);
Thread.sleep(1000);
}
catch (IOException e)
{
System.out.println("Error:"+e);
}
catch (InterruptedException e)
{
System.out.println("Error:"+e);
}
}
}
public Server() throws IOException
{
super("server");
socket = new MulticastSocket(4446);
group = InetAddress.getByName("239.231.12.3");
socket.joinGroup(group);
}
public void run()
{
while(1>0)
{
try
{
byte[] buf = new byte[256];
DatagramPacket pkt = new DatagramPacket(buf,buf.length);
//String msg = reader.readLine();
String pid = ManagementFactory.getRuntimeMXBean().getName();
buf = pid.getBytes();
pkt = new DatagramPacket(buf,buf.length,group,4446);
socket.send(pkt);
Thread t = new Thread(new Receive());
t.start();
while(t.isAlive())
{
t.join(1000);
}
sleep(1);
}
catch (IOException e)
{
System.out.println("Error:"+e);
}
catch (InterruptedException e)
{
System.out.println("Error:"+e);
}
}
//socket.close();
}
public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException
{
new Server().start();
//System.out.println("Hello");
}
}
First thing is first: your classes should start with a capital letter per the Java Naming Conventions:
Class names should be nouns, in mixed case with the first letter of
each internal word capitalized. Try to
keep your class names simple and
descriptive. Use whole words-avoid
acronyms and abbreviations (unless the
abbreviation is much more widely used
than the long form, such as URL or
HTML).
Second:
Try to break down the code into coherent sections and organize them around some common feature that you're dealing with... perhaps around the functionality or the model you're programming.
The (basic) model for the server is that the only thing it does is receive socket connections... the server relies on a handler to handle those connections and that's it. If you try to build that model it would look something like this:
class Server{
private final ServerSocket serverSocket;
private final ExecutorService pool;
public Server(int port, int poolSize) throws IOException {
serverSocket = new ServerSocket(port);
pool = Executors.newFixedThreadPool(poolSize);
}
public void serve() {
try {
while(true) {
pool.execute(new Handler(serverSocket.accept()));
}
} catch (IOException ex) {
pool.shutdown();
}
}
}
class Handler implements Runnable {
private final Socket socket;
Handler(Socket socket) { this.socket = socket; }
public void run() {
// receive the datagram packets
}
}
Third: I would recommend that you look at some existing examples.
Multi-threaded Client/Server Applications:
http://www.ase.md/~aursu/ClientServerThreads.html
Doug Lea:
http://www.developer.com/java/ent/article.php/3645111/Java-5s-BlockingQueue.htm (thanks to John)
http://gee.cs.oswego.edu/dl/cpj/index.html (still can't find the exact example, but it's there somewhere... if you feel brave look over his allcode.java file).
Concurrency in Practice examples:
http://www.javaconcurrencyinpractice.com/listings.html
Java Concurrency Tutorials:
http://java.sun.com/docs/books/tutorial/essential/concurrency/
Updated per comments:
OK Ravi, there are some big issues with your code and some minor issues with it:
I assume that the Receive class is your client... you should pull that out as a separate program (with its own main class) and run your server and multiple clients at the same time. Spawning a new "client thread" from your server for every new UDP package you send is a disturbing idea (big issue).
When you make your client application, you should make it run the receiving code in its own while loop (minor issue), e.g.:
public class Client extends Thread
{
public Client(/*..*/)
{
// initialize your client
}
public void run()
{
while(true)
{
// receive UDP packets
// process the UDP packets
}
}
public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException
{
// start your client
new Client().start();
}
}
You should only need just one thread per client and one thread per server (you technically don't even a separate thread in there since main has its own thread), so you might not find the ExecutorService that useful.
Otherwise your approach is correct... but I would still recommend that you check out some of examples.
Wanting to create threads in an application is not absurd! You won't need exactly 2 threads, but I think you're talking about 2 classes that implement the Runnable interface.
The threading API has gotten better since Java 1.5 and you don't need to mess with java.lang.Thread anymore. You can simply create a java.util.concurrent.Executor and submit Runnable instances to it.
The book Java Concurrency in Practice uses that exact problem - creating a threaded socket server - and walks through several iterations of the code to show the best way to do it. Check out the free sample chapter, which is great. I won't copy/paste the code here, but look specifically at listing 6.8.
It's a good thing Eclipse's history works even for a day back :) Thanks to that, I am able to give both Ravi a working example and Lirik his answer on leakage.
Let me first start of by stating that I have no clue what is causing this leak, but if I leave it long enough, it will fail on a OutOfMemoryError.
Second, I left the working code commented out for Ravi for a working basic example of my UDP server. The timeout was there to test how long my firewall would kill the receivers end (30 seconds). Just remove anything with the pool, and you're good to go.
So here is, a working but leaking version of my example threaded UDP server.
public class TestServer {
private static Integer TIMEOUT = 30;
private final static int MAX_BUFFER_SIZE = 8192;
private final static int MAX_LISTENER_THREADS = 5;
private final static SimpleDateFormat DateFormat = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy-dd-MM HH:mm:ss.SSSZ");
private int mPort;
private DatagramSocket mSocket;
// You can remove this for a working version
private ExecutorService mPool;
public TestServer(int port) {
mPort = port;
try {
mSocket = new DatagramSocket(mPort);
mSocket.setReceiveBufferSize(MAX_BUFFER_SIZE);
mSocket.setSendBufferSize(MAX_BUFFER_SIZE);
mSocket.setSoTimeout(0);
// You can uncomment this for a working version
//for (int i = 0; i < MAX_LISTENER_THREADS; i++) {
// new Thread(new Listener(mSocket)).start();
//}
// You can remove this for a working version
mPool = Executors.newFixedThreadPool(MAX_LISTENER_THREADS);
} catch (IOException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
// You can remove this for a working version
public void start() {
try {
try {
while (true) {
mPool.execute(new Listener(mSocket));
}
} catch (Exception e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
} finally {
mPool.shutdown();
}
}
private class Listener implements Runnable {
private final DatagramSocket socket;
public Listener(DatagramSocket serverSocket) {
socket = serverSocket;
}
private String readLn(DatagramPacket packet) throws IOException {
socket.receive(packet);
return new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(new ByteArrayInputStream(packet.getData())), MAX_BUFFER_SIZE).readLine();
}
private void writeLn(DatagramPacket packet, String string) throws IOException {
packet.setData(string.concat("\r\n").getBytes());
socket.send(packet);
}
#Override
public void run() {
DatagramPacket packet = new DatagramPacket(new byte[MAX_BUFFER_SIZE], MAX_BUFFER_SIZE);
String s;
while (true) {
try {
packet = new DatagramPacket(new byte[MAX_BUFFER_SIZE], MAX_BUFFER_SIZE);
s = readLn(packet);
System.out.println(DateFormat.format(new Date()) + " Received: " + s);
Thread.sleep(TIMEOUT * 1000);
writeLn(packet, s);
System.out.println(DateFormat.format(new Date()) + " Sent: " + s);
} catch (IOException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
}
}
public static void main(String[] args) {
if (args.length == 1) {
try {
TIMEOUT = Integer.parseInt(args[0]);
} catch (Exception e) {
TIMEOUT = 30;
}
}
System.out.println(DateFormat.format(new Date()) + " Timeout: " + TIMEOUT);
//new TestServer(4444);
new TestServer(4444).start();
}
}
btw. #Lirik, I witnessed this behavior first in Eclipse, after which I tested it from the command line. And again, I have NO clue what is causing it ;) sorry...
2 threads is fine. One reader another writer. Remember that with UDP you should not spawn new handler threads (unless what you're doing takes a long time), I recommend throwing the incoming messages into a processing Queue. The same for the send, have a send thread that blocks on an incoming Queue for UDP send.

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