RFR 9: 8087286 Need a way to handle control-C and possibly some other signals

[Chris Hegarty]

On 03/02/16 15:20, Thomas Stüfe wrote:
> On Wed, Feb 3, 2016 at 4:05 AM, David Holmes <david.holmes at oracle.com>
> wrote:
>
>> On 3/02/2016 8:08 AM, Stuart Marks wrote:
>>
>>> Hi Roger,
>>>
>>> It will be good to get this into the JDK. Lots of people have been
>>> asking for this.
>>>
>>
>> I think this API is a big mistake. The primary usecase seems to be
>> control-C interception for utilities like jshell. Adding a general purpose
>> signal raising and handling mechanism to the JDK does not seem like a good
>> solution to me. While you would need to use signal management under the
>> covers I think it would be much cleaner to expose an API that actually
>> captures what it is you want here: a mechanism to manage "interrupt" and
>> "terminate" events at the VM level, in a clean cross-platform way.
>>
>>
> I agree with David. One problem I see is that it is difficult to write
> portable java applications with this API. Not only are WIndows and Posix
> are very different, but also there are also sublte differences between
> Posix platforms. For instance, in the jbs SIGTRAP was mentioned as a
> possible signal someone wanted to raise, but SIGTRAP is used by the JIT in
> the powerpc port. So applications using Signal.of("SIGTRAP") would run fine
> on x86, but cause a crash on powerpc.

I accept the sentiment of your mail, but I suspect that
Signal.of("SIGTRAP") would throw UOE with this API, and not crash
the VM, otherwise it is a bug.

-Chris.

> Kind Regards, Thomas
>
> Aside: If you want to see some prior art in this area look at
>> PosixSignalHandler API in the Real-Time Specification for Java.
>>
>> Which reminds me - do you propose to support the POSIX real-time signals?
>>
>> David
>> -----
>>
>>
>> I have a few comments on the API.
>>>
>>> 1) Is there a way to query the set of signals supported? This might be a
>>> Set<String> returned by a static method, for example. I agree that
>>> signal strings outside this set shouldn't be supported.
>>>
>>> 2) The Signal class spec mentions SIGINT, SIGHUP, and SIGTERM
>>> explicitly. Are these required to be implemented on all platforms, or
>>> just on "unix-like" platforms, are they just examples? What signals are
>>> available on Windows?
>>>
>>> 3) raise() is spec'd to throw an exception if there's no handler
>>> registered. But wouldn't it make sense to allow it if the default
>>> handler is registered?
>>>
>>> 4) In an earlier message you said that the Signal object is a
>>> capability, so the security check is on getting a reference. It seems to
>>> me that setting a handler is in a different category from raising a
>>> signal; this suggests to me that using the same object as a capability
>>> for both should be rethought.
>>>
>>> 5) I don't understand the asymmetry between register() and unregister().
>>> Your earlier exchanges with Chris and with Gerard touched on this,
>>> specifically, the requirement that the caller pass unregister() a
>>> reference to the old handler in order for unregistration to work. You
>>> had said this was safer, if there are uncoordinated pieces of code
>>> attempting to set/unset signal handlers.
>>>
>>> It looks to me like this API is really about maintaining process global
>>> state consisting of a single handler -- user-specified or default -- for
>>> each supported signal. (I agree that it shouldn't try to have a stack or
>>> a chain of handlers.) There are a few other things that are global like
>>> this, such as the security manager and policy, System.setIn/Out/Err, and
>>> so forth. As such, uncoordinated access to the signal API is pretty much
>>> broken no matter what. Thus I don't think it makes sense to have a
>>> CAS-like protocol for unregistering a handler, to protect against the
>>> case where "somebody else" might have registered a handler different
>>> from yours.
>>>
>>> Something like this might make sense:
>>>
>>>       void register(Consumer<Signal> handler);
>>>       void unregister();
>>>
>>> The register() call would be pretty much as currently specified; the
>>> unregister() call would restore the default handler. Alternatively,
>>> register(null) could be used instead of unregister(), but this is quite
>>> minor.
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>>
>>> s'marks
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On 2/1/16 8:02 AM, Roger Riggs wrote:
>>>
>>>> Please review an API addition to handle signals such as SIGINT,
>>>> SIGHUP, and
>>>> SIGTERM.
>>>> This JEP 260 motivated alternative to sun.misc.Signal supports the use
>>>> case for
>>>> interactive applications that need to handle Control-C and other signals.
>>>>
>>>> The new java.util.Signal class provides a settable primary signal
>>>> handler and a
>>>> default
>>>> signal handler.  The primary signal handler can be unregistered and
>>>> handling is
>>>> restored
>>>> to the default signal handler.  System initialization registers
>>>> default signal
>>>> handlers
>>>> to terminate on SIGINT, SIGHUP, and SIGTERM.  Use of the Signal API
>>>> requires
>>>> a permission if a SecurityManager is set.
>>>>
>>>> The sun.misc.Signal implementation is modified to be layered on a common
>>>> thread and dispatch mechanism. The VM handling of native signals is
>>>> not affected.
>>>> The command option to reduce signal use by the runtime with -Xrs is
>>>> unmodified.
>>>>
>>>> The changes to hotspot are minimal to rename the hardcoded callback to
>>>> the Java
>>>> Signal dispatcher.
>>>>
>>>> Please review and comment on the API and implementation.
>>>>
>>>> javadoc:
>>>>     http://cr.openjdk.java.net/~rriggs/signal-doc/
>>>>
>>>> Webrev:
>>>> jdk:  http://cr.openjdk.java.net/~rriggs/webrev-signal-8087286/
>>>> hotspot: http://cr.openjdk.java.net/~rriggs/webrev-hs-signal-8087286/
>>>>
>>>> Issue:
>>>>      https://bugs.openjdk.java.net/browse/JDK-8087286
>>>>
>>>> JEP 260:
>>>>     https://bugs.openjdk.java.net/browse/JDK-8132928
>>>>
>>>> Thanks, Roger
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>