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From: Willem <willem@turtle.stack.nl>
Newsgroups: comp.programming
Subject: Re: server
Date: Tue, 4 Sep 2012 23:25:30 +0000 (UTC)
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bob wrote:
) There are two main ways I can see to make a server that serves multiple users simultaneously.
)
) One is to use threads.
)
) The other is to use non-blocking sockets.  
)
) Has anyone actually used the latter approach in practice or do they pretty much always use multiple threads?

Not using threads avoids a lot of concurrency issues, race conditions and
whatnot, making programming a lot simpler.  All one has to worry about is
to handle any single request in a short amount of time, to keep the latency
acceptable.

Most MUDs that I know of are single-threaded, and use 'select' calls and
non-blocking sockets to service multiple users.  There are usually tens to
hundreds of connections to a MUD, back when they were quite popular.

Basically, as long as you avoid blocking calls, you don't need threads.
A hybrid approach is to use a single thread that services all the
non-blocking sockets, which hands off long-running or blocking tasks
to worker threads.


SaSW, Willem
-- 
Disclaimer: I am in no way responsible for any of the statements
            made in the above text. For all I know I might be
            drugged or something..
            No I'm not paranoid. You all think I'm paranoid, don't you !
#EOT