C - filling TCP socket send buffer - c

I'm trying to write an experimental client / server program to prove whether the write fails or blocks when the send buffer is full.
Basically, I have an infinite loop on the sender program where I use select() to check if I can write on the buffer (which, I think means that the socket buffer isn't full), if I can write on the buffer than I write() a character. The loop breaks when FD_ISSET(sockfd, &writefds) is false (I can't write on the buffer because it's full).
The reciever program is sleeping for one minute before starting to read(). I expect the sender to fill the buffer within this sleeping time but in fect, the programs never end.
sender:
int main(int argc, char *argv[]) {
char buffer[100];
int sockfd, total = 0, bytes = 0;
fd_set writefds;
sockfd = dial(argv[1], argv[2]);
bzero(buffer, sizeof buffer);
while(1)
{
int ret = 0;
FD_ZERO(&writefds);
FD_SET(sockfd, &writefds);
if((ret = select(sockfd + 1, NULL, &writefds, NULL, 0)) < 0)
{
perror("select");
exit(errno);
}
if(FD_ISSET(sockfd, &writefds))
{
write(sockfd, "a", 1);
total++;
continue;
}
else
{
puts("I can't write in the socket buffer");
break;
}
}
printf("nb chars written: %d\n", total);
return 0;
}
reciever:
int foo(int sockfd) {
char buffer[100];
int t, total = 0;
bzero(buffer, sizeof buffer);
printf("I have a new client\n");
sleep(60);
while((t = read(sockfd, buffer, sizeof buffer)) > 0)
{
total += t;
printf("%d ", total);
}
printf("nb chars read: %d\n", total);
if(t < 0)
{
perror("read");
}
printf("I don't have that client anymore\n");
return 0;
}

Your select timeout is null, so select() will block when the send buffer is full. This means when it returns, the socket is writable, and you'll never get to your code "I can't write in the socket buffer".
See man page http://linux.die.net/man/2/select
If you want a zero timeout, i.e. don't block on select(), you need to pass a pointer to a timeval structure with both fields set to zero.

You're on the right track, but the socket send buffer could be 48k or more. That's a lot of iterations. Try writing 8k at a time, not just one byte. And increase the time before the receiver reads.
NB No real need to test this. It blocks in blocking mode, and fails with EAGAIN/EWOULDBLOCK in non-blocking mode. See the man page.

Related

Properly sending and receiving buffers in C

I'm writing some server/client program in C Windows. I don't know if I'm sending and receiving buffers the right way, on google I only see people error checking it but not checking if the send() function sent less bytes then expected. This is an example from my project:
Client:
// send buffer size
uint32_t num = htonl(sizeBuffer);
char* converted_num = (char*)&num;
res = send(ClientSocket, converted_num, sizeof(uint32_t), 0);
if (res == SOCKET_ERROR)
{
printf("error send\n");
}
// send buffer
while (totalSent < sizeBuffer)
{
sent = send(ClientSocket, totalBuffer, sizeBuffer, 0);
totalSent += sent;
printf("sent: %d\n", sent);
printf("totalSent: %d\n", totalSent);
}
Server:
// recv buffer size
char b[sizeof(uint32_t)];
r = recv(s, b, sizeof(uint32_t), 0);
if (r == SOCKET_ERROR)
{
printf("error recv\n");
}
uint32_t sizeBuffer = ntohl_ch(&b[0]);
// recv buffer
while (totalReceived < sizeBuffer)
{
received = recv(s, buffer, sizeBuffer, 0);
strcat(totalBuffer, buffer);
bzero(buffer, 18384);
totalReceived += received;
printf("received: %d\n", received);
printf("totalReceived: %d\n", totalReceived);
}
printf("%s", totalBuffer);
The reason I use strcat() is because when I use printf() inside the while() loop it gets printed weirdly, like the previous buffer gets printed and the new buffer gets printed on top. I don't know why it behaves like this.
Is this the right way to send and receive buffers? And do I also have to check whether the size (num) of the buffer is send correctly, like how I send the buffer itself? If yes, how can I do that?

Send/Read using a TCP socket, anomalies in the byte sizes

I'm trying to implement a working HTTP Client-Server application just to make practice with network programming.
The 2 programs have to follow this basic algorithm:
CLIENT - send a GET request
SERVER - send "+OK\r\n"
SERVER - send file size in bytes
SERVER - send file
CLIENT - send ACK
I'm having a lot of troubles in the reading part, probably because i perform some dirty read on the stream.
These are the 2 reading function that i'm using:
/* Reads a line from stream socket s to buffer ptr
The line is stored in ptr including the final '\n'
At most maxlen chasracters are read*/
int readline (SOCKET s, char *ptr, size_t maxlen)
{
size_t n;
ssize_t nread;
char c;
for (n=1; n<maxlen; n++)
{
nread=recv(s, &c, 1, 0);
if (nread == 1)
{
*ptr++ = c;
if (c == '\n')
break;
}
else if (nread == 0) /* connection closed by party */
{
*ptr = 0;
return (n-1);
}
else /* error */
return (-1);
}
*ptr = 0;
return (n);
}
and:
int readNumber(SOCKET s, long *num, int maxRead)
{
size_t n;
ssize_t nread;
int totRead;
long number=0;
for (n=1; n<maxRead+1; n++)
{
nread=recv(s, &number, sizeof(number), 0);
if (nread == sizeof(number))
{
totRead+=nread;
*num = number;
}
else if (nread == 0) /* connection closed by party */
{
*num = 0;
return (n-1);
}
else /* error */
{
printf("nread = %d\n", nread);
return (-1);
}
}
return (totRead);
}
this is the snippet of the main where i receive the +OK message and then the file size:
memset(rbuf,0,sizeof(rbuf)); //rbuf is the buffer where is store the read
printf("waiting for response...\n");
result = readline(s, rbuf, sizeof(rbuf)); //reading function is above
printf("Byte read(okMsg) = %d\n", result);
if (result <= 0)
//ERROR MANAGEMENT
{
printf("Read error/Connection closed\n");
closesocket(s);
SockCleanup();
exit(1);
}
else
{
long fileLength=0;
unsigned char *fBuf;
//RECEIVE OK
if(!strcmp(rbuf,"+OK\r\n"))
{
puts("+OK\n");
//RECEIVE FILE LEN
int nw = readNumber(s, &fileLength, 1); //reading function is above
printf("Byte read(fDim) = %d\n", nw);
printf("File is %ld bytes long\n", fileLength);
if(nw >0)
{
// RECEIVE FILE
}
}
}
When i send the "+OK\r\n" string the server tells me that it sends 8 bytes, but when i read i find the '\0' char only after 6 bytes.
By the way it reads correctly the message, but when i try to read the file size (that is a long) it gives me back a wrong number.
My opinion is that the stream buffer is dirty, and that i'm reading 2 bytes that are not part of the file size, but i'm not understanding why this happens.
Please ask me more info if i'm not clear enough.
SOLVED:
Thank you all for your answers!!!
You put me in the right mindset to understand what was wrong.
Look like the problem was this declaration in the server:
char *okMsg = "+OK\r\n";
instead of
char okMsg[] = "+OK\r\n";
that lead me to an undefined behavior.
long number=0;
for (n=1; n<maxRead+1; n++)
{
nread=recv(s, &number, sizeof(number), 0);
You forgot to design and implement a protocol to carry the data between your server and your client. Because TCP provides a stream of bytes, your protocol should be defined as a stream of bytes.
How many bytes convey this number? Is "however many bytes a 'long' happens to occupy on my platform" a good answer? What's the semantic meaning of the first byte? Is "whatever the first byte of a 'long' happens to mean on my platform" a good answer?
A good answer would be, "The size shall be conveyed as a 4-byte unsigned integer in little-endian byte order". Then make absolutely sure your code sends and receives in that format.

Writing send_all and recv_all functions for sockets in C

I am a new C programmer and so you will have to excuse my lack of knowledge. I am trying to use sockets in C on a windows machine to send data back and forth between a client and server. I am using the tools of cygwin with the codeblocks IDE. Simple send and receives were not working and so after some searching I was under the impression my problem was I needed a send_all and recv_all function. I have written the following two functions but receive seems to always get stuck in an infinite loop. I am not really sure why.
void send_all(int socket, void *buffer, int length) {
size_t i = 0;
for (i = 0; i < length; i += send(socket, buffer, length - i, 0)){
printf("Completed: %d bytes \r", i);
}
printf("Send Completed: %d bytes \n", length);
}
void recv_all(int sockfd, void *buffer, int length){
size_t i = 0;
for (i = 0; i < length; i+= recv(sockfd, buffer + i, length - i, 0)){
printf("Completed: %d bytes \r", i);
}
printf("Receive Completed: %d bytes \n", length);
}
I am wondering if it is because the receive doesn't know how many bytes the send is sending it. All advice is appreciated but please keep it constructive. Thanks.
recv() actually returns a signed value (int in Winsock, ssize_t in POSIX). Its return value can be a negative number if a read error occurred, OR if the socket is in non-blocking mode and no data is available. Its return value is zero if the socket was closed gracefully (this would cause an infinite loop in your code).
You will need to check the return value before you add it to your byte counter, to detect both of these conditions.
If your socket is in blocking mode (the default), your code will block indefinitely until the required amount of data has been received, or an error occurs (once you add code to check for that). Given the name of your function this seems to be the behavior you want. If so, your general approach is sound.
ssize_t bytesRead = 0;
while (bytesRead < length)
{
ssize_t rv = recv(/* ... */);
if (rv == 0)
{
printf("Socket closed gracefully before enough data received\n");
break;
}
else if (rv < 0)
{
// if your socket is non-blocking, check for EAGAIN which
// would mean no data is currently available; in this case you
// could do something like call select() on the socket to
// go to sleep until more data comes in
printf("Read error occurred before enough data received\n");
break;
}
bytesRead += rv;
}

Trying to pipe data from a child-process server to its parent process

I'm working on an assignment for my Distributed Systems class. I'm a master's student in C.S., but my specialty in programming is .NET and I'm working on a project that requires some fairly involved Unix knowledge, which is tripping me up.
The assignment is implementing a flush channel protocol API. So I'm coding a small function library that other apps can implement to use flush channel communication. I've set it up so that when the init function is called, it forks a child process to act as the server for incoming messages. The child communicates with the parent process by sending incoming data to the parent through a pipe.
This works OK if messages are sent and received one at a time; e.g.,
send -> receive -> send -> receive -> etc.
However, if multiple messages are sent before doing any receives; e.g.,
send -> send -> send -> receive
then it gets messed up. Specifically, the first message is received correctly, but when I go to receive the second message, the program hangs and needs to be killed. I've done a lot of searching online and been plugging away at this for hours but haven't made much progress.
The program as a whole is far too large to show here, but here are the most relevant bits. Here's the part where I get the server going and receive messages. Note the line
write(fd[1], buffer, (strlen(buffer)+1));
-- I think that's a good candidate for being the source of the problem here, but not sure what to do differently. (Tried fwrite() and that didn't work at all.)
fd = malloc(2 * sizeof(int));
int nbytes;
if (pipe(fd) < 0) {
perror("Could not create pipe");
return -1;
}
pID = fork();
if (pID < 0) {
perror("Failed to fork");
return -1;
} else if (pID == 0) { // child
close(fd[0]); // close input side of pipe
int cc;
int fsize;
struct sockaddr_in from;
int serials[500];
int i;
for (i = 0; i < 500; i++) serials[i] = 0;
char buffer[2048];
while (1) {
fsize = sizeof(from);
cc = recvfrom(socketNo, buffer, 2048, 0, (struct sockaddr*)&from, &fsize);
if (cc < 0) perror("Receive error");
datagram data = decodeDatagram(buffer);
if (serials[data.serial] == 0) {
write(fd[1], buffer, (strlen(buffer)+1));
serials[data.serial] = 1;
}
}
} else { // parent
close(fd[1]); // close output side of pipe
return 0;
}
(The "serials" array is for not forwarding repeated messages, as messages are sent multiple times to improve reliability. I know a fixed size for this array is not good practice, but the tests for this assignment don't send that many messages so it's OK in this context.)
The beginning of the receive function looks like this:
int fRecv(int* id, char* buf, int nbytes) {
checkDatagramTable(*id);
char* tbuf = malloc((nbytes + 9) * sizeof(char));
int rbytes = read(fd[0], tbuf, nbytes + 9);
The "+9" is to accommodate additional information that gets packaged along with the message to be sent, for flush channel ordering. This is also a pretty sketchy area, but allocating more space to be extra sure has not helped the issue.
I know there's quite a bit of extraneous stuff in here, references to other functions etc. But the problem surely lies in how I'm piping the data through, so the source of my issue should lie there somewhere.
Thanks in advance for your assistance; it is truly appreciated.
This looks suspicious. (what is in the packets? They could be binary) Where is the typedefinition for datagram ?
fsize = sizeof(from);
cc = recvfrom(socketNo, buffer, 2048, 0, (struct sockaddr*)&from, &fsize);
if (cc < 0) perror("Receive error");
datagram data = decodeDatagram(buffer);
if (serials[data.serial] == 0) {
write(fd[1], buffer, (strlen(buffer)+1)); // <-- ????
serials[data.serial] = 1;
}
I'd try instead:
write(fd[1], buffer, cc);
UPDATE:
If the message is not null terminated, you'll have to terminate it explicitly:
(if cc == 2048) cc -= 1;
buffer [cc] = '\0'; // <<--
datagram data = decodedatagram(buffer);
...
Also, it is advisable to use "sizeof buffer" instead of "2048".
UPDATE2:
You could test if the strings in the packets are really null-terminated by:
unsigned pos;
cc = recvfrom(socketNo, buffer, 2048, 0, (struct sockaddr*)&from, &fsize);
if (cc < 0) perror("Receive error");
for pos=0; pos < cc; pos++) {
if (buff[pos] == 0) break;
}
switch (cc-pos) {
case 0: fprintf (stderr, "No nul byte found in packet: I lose!\n" ); break;
default: fprintf (stderr, "Spurious nul byte found in the middle of packet\n" );
case 1: break;
}
datagram data = decodeDatagram(buffer);
if (serials[data.serial] == 0) {
write(fd[1], buffer, cc);
serials[data.serial] = 1;
}

recv() functions flag for taking the while buffer in one string [windows C]

This code sends and recv s txt file perfectly but cannot do it to otehr formats like .exe or .img. Please help me with these as I need to use htonl or htons??
Take a look!!
Here is the server side recv function ::
if (socket_type != SOCK_DGRAM)
{
fi = fopen (final,"wb");
retval = recv(msgsock, recv_buf, strlen(recv_buf), 0);
/*recv_buf[retval] = '\0';
fprintf (fi,"%s",recv_buf);*/
int i;
i=atoi(recv_buf);
char *q;
q=(char *)malloc(i*sizeof(char));
retval = recv(msgsock, q, strlen(q), 0);
//printf ("%s",q);
fwrite(q,i,1,fi);
fclose(fi);
}
else
{
retval = recvfrom(msgsock,recv_buf, sizeof(recv_buf), 0, (struct sockaddr *)&from, &fromlen);
printf("Server: Received datagram from %s\n", inet_ntoa(from.sin_addr));
printf ("SOCK_DGRAM");
}
if (retval == SOCKET_ERROR)
{
fprintf(stderr,"Server: recv() failed: error %d\n", WSAGetLastError());
closesocket(msgsock);
//continue;
}
else
printf("Server: recv() is OK.\n");
if (retval == 0)
{
printf("Server: Client closed connection.\n");
closesocket(msgsock);
//continue;
}
printf("Server: Received %d bytes, data from client\n", retval);
The client side sending function :::
void send_command()
{
int bytesent;
FILE *file_out;
//file_out = fopen(file_path,"rb");
char str_all[100000];//flag [30]="end";
///////////////////////getsize//////////////
char fsize[5];
int filesize;
file_out = fopen(file_path, "rb");
fseek(file_out, 0, SEEK_END);
filesize = ftell(file_out);
rewind (file_out);
itoa (filesize,fsize,10);
/////////////////////////////////////////////
send (ConnectSocket, fsize, strlen (fsize), 0);
char *r = (char *)malloc (filesize * sizeof(char));
fread(r,filesize,1,file_out);
bytesent = send( ConnectSocket, r, strlen(r), 0 );
printf("\nClient: Bytes sent: %ld\n", bytesent);
fclose (file_out);
/*while (fscanf(file_out,"%s",&str_all) != EOF)
{
bytesent = send( ConnectSocket, str_all, strlen(str_all), 0 );
printf("\nClient: Bytes sent: %ld\n", bytesent);
//Sleep(500);
}*/
/*printf("%s",flag);
send( ConnectSocket, flag, strlen(flag), 0 );*/
WSACleanup();
//return 0;
}
OK, there are multiple issues with your program.
You are transferring binary data. The receiver is only going to see a sequence of bytes. There is no way for the receiver to know the end of the data, since all possible values of char are legal data values. If you were sending text data, you could say that a 0 signifies the end of the data, but now you can't. So, you have to decide on a "protocol" between the server and the client—the simplest is that the server sends the length of the data in the first 4 bytes (read up on ntonl() and ntohl() for how to do this portably). Then, the receiver will know exactly how many bytes to read.
You declare the receiver buffer as char *recv_buf, and similarly for recv_buf1. You don't allocate any storage for any of the two pointers, so they aren't pointing to anywhere useful. Then, your recv call is: recv(msgsock, recv_buf, sizeof(recv_buf), 0); This also has problems. The first is the one mentioned above: you don't have storage for recv_buf. The second is that after you do allocate storage for recv_buf, you are taking the size of a char pointer instead of the length of the buffer recv points to. One easy way to solve both the issues would be to declare recv_buf as: char recv_buf[SIZE]; and then use sizeof recv_buf in the recv() call.
I haven't looked at the rest of your code. You probably need a good C and network programming introduction.
I think you're confusing the null-termination of a C string with the end of a packet sent on a socket. There is no "termination" of a packet, it's just a string of bytes. Zeros are completely legal, and you pass (and receive) the length explicitly. You certainly don't need to use the out-of-band facilities to receive multiple packets. Can you be more specific about what you're asking?

Resources