| Index: third_party/sqlite/src/ext/async/README.txt
|
| diff --git a/third_party/sqlite/src/ext/async/README.txt b/third_party/sqlite/src/ext/async/README.txt
|
| new file mode 100644
|
| index 0000000000000000000000000000000000000000..05acffe0df6ed2883d7861a4dbe2ae365c510661
|
| --- /dev/null
|
| +++ b/third_party/sqlite/src/ext/async/README.txt
|
| @@ -0,0 +1,164 @@
|
| +
|
| +Normally, when SQLite writes to a database file, it waits until the write
|
| +operation is finished before returning control to the calling application.
|
| +Since writing to the file-system is usually very slow compared with CPU
|
| +bound operations, this can be a performance bottleneck. This directory
|
| +contains an extension that causes SQLite to perform all write requests
|
| +using a separate thread running in the background. Although this does not
|
| +reduce the overall system resources (CPU, disk bandwidth etc.) at all, it
|
| +allows SQLite to return control to the caller quickly even when writing to
|
| +the database, eliminating the bottleneck.
|
| +
|
| + 1. Functionality
|
| +
|
| + 1.1 How it Works
|
| + 1.2 Limitations
|
| + 1.3 Locking and Concurrency
|
| +
|
| + 2. Compilation and Usage
|
| +
|
| + 3. Porting
|
| +
|
| +
|
| +
|
| +1. FUNCTIONALITY
|
| +
|
| + With asynchronous I/O, write requests are handled by a separate thread
|
| + running in the background. This means that the thread that initiates
|
| + a database write does not have to wait for (sometimes slow) disk I/O
|
| + to occur. The write seems to happen very quickly, though in reality
|
| + it is happening at its usual slow pace in the background.
|
| +
|
| + Asynchronous I/O appears to give better responsiveness, but at a price.
|
| + You lose the Durable property. With the default I/O backend of SQLite,
|
| + once a write completes, you know that the information you wrote is
|
| + safely on disk. With the asynchronous I/O, this is not the case. If
|
| + your program crashes or if a power loss occurs after the database
|
| + write but before the asynchronous write thread has completed, then the
|
| + database change might never make it to disk and the next user of the
|
| + database might not see your change.
|
| +
|
| + You lose Durability with asynchronous I/O, but you still retain the
|
| + other parts of ACID: Atomic, Consistent, and Isolated. Many
|
| + appliations get along fine without the Durablity.
|
| +
|
| + 1.1 How it Works
|
| +
|
| + Asynchronous I/O works by creating a special SQLite "vfs" structure
|
| + and registering it with sqlite3_vfs_register(). When files opened via
|
| + this vfs are written to (using the vfs xWrite() method), the data is not
|
| + written directly to disk, but is placed in the "write-queue" to be
|
| + handled by the background thread.
|
| +
|
| + When files opened with the asynchronous vfs are read from
|
| + (using the vfs xRead() method), the data is read from the file on
|
| + disk and the write-queue, so that from the point of view of
|
| + the vfs reader the xWrite() appears to have already completed.
|
| +
|
| + The special vfs is registered (and unregistered) by calls to the
|
| + API functions sqlite3async_initialize() and sqlite3async_shutdown().
|
| + See section "Compilation and Usage" below for details.
|
| +
|
| + 1.2 Limitations
|
| +
|
| + In order to gain experience with the main ideas surrounding asynchronous
|
| + IO, this implementation is deliberately kept simple. Additional
|
| + capabilities may be added in the future.
|
| +
|
| + For example, as currently implemented, if writes are happening at a
|
| + steady stream that exceeds the I/O capability of the background writer
|
| + thread, the queue of pending write operations will grow without bound.
|
| + If this goes on for long enough, the host system could run out of memory.
|
| + A more sophisticated module could to keep track of the quantity of
|
| + pending writes and stop accepting new write requests when the queue of
|
| + pending writes grows too large.
|
| +
|
| + 1.3 Locking and Concurrency
|
| +
|
| + Multiple connections from within a single process that use this
|
| + implementation of asynchronous IO may access a single database
|
| + file concurrently. From the point of view of the user, if all
|
| + connections are from within a single process, there is no difference
|
| + between the concurrency offered by "normal" SQLite and SQLite
|
| + using the asynchronous backend.
|
| +
|
| + If file-locking is enabled (it is enabled by default), then connections
|
| + from multiple processes may also read and write the database file.
|
| + However concurrency is reduced as follows:
|
| +
|
| + * When a connection using asynchronous IO begins a database
|
| + transaction, the database is locked immediately. However the
|
| + lock is not released until after all relevant operations
|
| + in the write-queue have been flushed to disk. This means
|
| + (for example) that the database may remain locked for some
|
| + time after a "COMMIT" or "ROLLBACK" is issued.
|
| +
|
| + * If an application using asynchronous IO executes transactions
|
| + in quick succession, other database users may be effectively
|
| + locked out of the database. This is because when a BEGIN
|
| + is executed, a database lock is established immediately. But
|
| + when the corresponding COMMIT or ROLLBACK occurs, the lock
|
| + is not released until the relevant part of the write-queue
|
| + has been flushed through. As a result, if a COMMIT is followed
|
| + by a BEGIN before the write-queue is flushed through, the database
|
| + is never unlocked,preventing other processes from accessing
|
| + the database.
|
| +
|
| + File-locking may be disabled at runtime using the sqlite3async_control()
|
| + API (see below). This may improve performance when an NFS or other
|
| + network file-system, as the synchronous round-trips to the server be
|
| + required to establish file locks are avoided. However, if multiple
|
| + connections attempt to access the same database file when file-locking
|
| + is disabled, application crashes and database corruption is a likely
|
| + outcome.
|
| +
|
| +
|
| +2. COMPILATION AND USAGE
|
| +
|
| + The asynchronous IO extension consists of a single file of C code
|
| + (sqlite3async.c), and a header file (sqlite3async.h) that defines the
|
| + C API used by applications to activate and control the modules
|
| + functionality.
|
| +
|
| + To use the asynchronous IO extension, compile sqlite3async.c as
|
| + part of the application that uses SQLite. Then use the API defined
|
| + in sqlite3async.h to initialize and configure the module.
|
| +
|
| + The asynchronous IO VFS API is described in detail in comments in
|
| + sqlite3async.h. Using the API usually consists of the following steps:
|
| +
|
| + 1. Register the asynchronous IO VFS with SQLite by calling the
|
| + sqlite3async_initialize() function.
|
| +
|
| + 2. Create a background thread to perform write operations and call
|
| + sqlite3async_run().
|
| +
|
| + 3. Use the normal SQLite API to read and write to databases via
|
| + the asynchronous IO VFS.
|
| +
|
| + Refer to sqlite3async.h for details.
|
| +
|
| +
|
| +3. PORTING
|
| +
|
| + Currently the asynchronous IO extension is compatible with win32 systems
|
| + and systems that support the pthreads interface, including Mac OSX, Linux,
|
| + and other varieties of Unix.
|
| +
|
| + To port the asynchronous IO extension to another platform, the user must
|
| + implement mutex and condition variable primitives for the new platform.
|
| + Currently there is no externally available interface to allow this, but
|
| + modifying the code within sqlite3async.c to include the new platforms
|
| + concurrency primitives is relatively easy. Search within sqlite3async.c
|
| + for the comment string "PORTING FUNCTIONS" for details. Then implement
|
| + new versions of each of the following:
|
| +
|
| + static void async_mutex_enter(int eMutex);
|
| + static void async_mutex_leave(int eMutex);
|
| + static void async_cond_wait(int eCond, int eMutex);
|
| + static void async_cond_signal(int eCond);
|
| + static void async_sched_yield(void);
|
| +
|
| + The functionality required of each of the above functions is described
|
| + in comments in sqlite3async.c.
|
| +
|
|
|