What are the disadvantages of select() on unix
One traditional way to write network servers is to have the main server block on accept(), waiting for a connection. Once a connection comes in, the server fork()s, the child process handles the connection and the main server is able to service new incoming requests.
With select(), instead of having a process for each request, there is usually only one process that "multi-plexes" all requests, servicing each request as much as it can.
So one main advantage of using select() is that your server will only require a single process to handle all requests. Thus, your server will not need shared memory or synchronization primitives for different 'tasks' to communicate.
One major disadvantage of using select(), is that your server cannot act like there's only one client, like with a fork()'ing solution. For example, with a fork()'ing solution, after the server fork()s, the child process works with the client as if there was only one client in the universe -- the child does not have to worry about new incoming connections or the existence of other sockets. With select(), the programming isn't as transparent.
Another viewpoint is, having fork() will require a separate stack for processes including text,data, and heap, however, having a single process and using select() will just create burden on single process and will not consume much memory, so crashing of this single process will result in failure of all connections.
One traditional way to write network servers is to have the main server block on accept(), waiting for a connection. Once a connection comes in, the server fork()s, the child process handles the connection and the main server is able to service new incoming requests.
With select(), instead of having a process for each request, there is usually only one process that "multi-plexes" all requests, servicing each request as much as it can.
So one main advantage of using select() is that your server will only require a single process to handle all requests. Thus, your server will not need shared memory or synchronization primitives for different 'tasks' to communicate.
One major disadvantage of using select(), is that your server cannot act like there's only one client, like with a fork()'ing solution. For example, with a fork()'ing solution, after the server fork()s, the child process works with the client as if there was only one client in the universe -- the child does not have to worry about new incoming connections or the existence of other sockets. With select(), the programming isn't as transparent.
Another viewpoint is, having fork() will require a separate stack for processes including text,data, and heap, however, having a single process and using select() will just create burden on single process and will not consume much memory, so crashing of this single process will result in failure of all connections.
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