Routing vs. Using Sockets

[Jeremy Goslin]

We’re currently working on migrating from AIX 5.1 using 3.8.1P to AIX 5.3 using Cloverleaf 5.4rev1. In our testing we found a strange thread configuration that I’m curious about.  

In our engine we’re splitting the incoming ADT into 3 different processes.  To do this we have one inbound thread that routes everything to 3 different outbound threads.  Those 3 outbound threads point right back to different sockets on the same box where we have 3 more inbound threads (each on a different process).  I’m told that’s the recommended way of configuring this sort of thing.  That’s not the question.  

While working on setting everything up in 5.4rev1 we noticed that the 3 outbound threads were configured to send everything to a local socket AND route all of their messages to the appropriate inbound thread.

I’m told that using a socket connection between an outbound and inbound thread is preferred.  So, we have removed the routing and are just using the sockets now.

I’m curious though, which is the better solution?  Is routing from an outbound to an inbound even supported?  Which is faster in the engine?

I’m new to all this, so bear with me.  🙂

Topic

[Scott Lee]

Jeremy,

If I understand correctly what you are describing, it is something that I do here….

In addition to the socket connection between two threads in different processes I will also add a ‘dummy’ route between the two threads.  This second route will never carry any messages since it points from an outbound thread to an inbound thread but it adds an arrow in the netconfig and netmonitor screens between the two threads.  This gives me a much better visual on where messages are being routed, even though they aren’t technically ‘routed across the arrow’.  It is a visual reminder for myself and anyone else looking at the netconfig that there is data passing in that direction.  It is strictly for display purposes since the socket route does not show on the screen.

Also, just so I don’t get confused as to the purpose of this ‘dummy’ routing, the name of the route is actually ‘dummy’.

Scott

[Jeremy Goslin]

That sounds exactly like what was going on with our site.

Thanks.

[Author]

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