...one of the most highly
regarded and expertly designed C++ library projects in the
world.
— Herb Sutter and Andrei
Alexandrescu, C++
Coding Standards
The spawn()
function is a high-level wrapper
for running stackful coroutines. It is based on the Boost.Coroutine library.
The spawn()
function enables programs to implement asynchronous logic in a synchronous
manner, as shown in the following example:
boost::asio::spawn(my_strand, do_echo, boost::asio::detached); // ... void do_echo(boost::asio::yield_context yield) { try { char data[128]; for (;;) { std::size_t length = my_socket.async_read_some( boost::asio::buffer(data), yield); boost::asio::async_write(my_socket, boost::asio::buffer(data, length), yield); } } catch (std::exception& e) { // ... } }
The first argument to spawn()
may be an executor or execution context.
This argument determines the context in which the coroutine is permitted
to execute. For example, a server's per-client object may consist of multiple
coroutines; they should all run on the same strand
so that no explicit synchronisation is required.
The second argument is a function object with signature:
void coroutine(boost::asio::yield_context yield);
that specifies the code to be run as part of the coroutine. The parameter
yield
may be passed to
an asynchronous operation in place of the completion handler, as in:
std::size_t length = my_socket.async_read_some( boost::asio::buffer(data), yield);
This starts the asynchronous operation and suspends the coroutine. The coroutine will be resumed automatically when the asynchronous operation completes.
Where an asynchronous operation's handler signature has the form:
void handler(boost::system::error_code ec, result_type result);
the initiating function returns the result_type. In the async_read_some
example above, this is size_t
.
If the asynchronous operation fails, the error_code
is converted into a system_error
exception and thrown.
Where a handler signature has the form:
void handler(boost::system::error_code ec);
the initiating function returns void
.
As above, an error is passed back to the coroutine as a system_error
exception.
To collect the error_code
from an operation, rather than have it throw an exception, associate the
output variable with the yield_context
as follows:
boost::system::error_code ec; std::size_t length = my_socket.async_read_some( boost::asio::buffer(data), yield[ec]);
Note: if spawn()
is used with a specified executor of
type Executor
, the function
object signature is actually:
void coroutine(boost::asio::basic_yield_context<Executor> yield);
spawn, yield_context, basic_yield_context, Spawn example (C++03), Spawn example (C++11), Stackless Coroutines.