Socket Programming

15-441 Computer Networks, Spring 2008

Xi Liu
 Lecture Today
• Motivation for sockets
• What’s in a socket?
• Working with socket
• Concurrent network applications
• Project 1
 Why Socket?
• How can I program a network application?
– Share data
– Send messages
– Finish course projects...

• IPC - Interprocess Communication

 Network Layering

7 Application
Application Application
Application
6 Presentation
Presentation Presentation
Presentation
5 Session
Session Session
Session
4 Transport
Transport Transport
Transport
3 Network
Network Network
Network Network
Network
2 Data
Datalink
link Data
Datalink
link Data
Datalink
link
1 Physical
Physical Physical
Physical Physical
Physical
 Network Layering
• Why layering?
7 Application
Application Application
Application
6 Presentation
Presentation Presentation
Presentation
5 Session
Session Session
Session
4 Transport
Transport Transport
Transport
3 Network
Network Network
Network Network
Network
2 Data
Datalink
link Data
Datalink
link Data
Datalink
link
1 Physical
Physical Physical
Physical Physical
Physical
 Layering Makes it Easier
• Application programmer
– Doesn’t need to send IP packets
– Doesn’t need to send Ethernet frames
– Doesn’t need to know how TCP implements
reliability
• Only need a way to pass the data down
– Socket is the API to access transport layer
functions
What Lower Layer Need to Know?
• We pass the data down. What else does the
lower layer need to know?
What Lower Layer Need to Know?
• We pass the data down. What else does the
lower layer need to know?

• How to identify the destination process?

– Where to send the data? (Addressing)
– What process gets the data when it is there?
(Multiplexing)
 Identify the Destination
• Addressing
– IP address
– hostname (resolve to IP address via DNS)
• Multiplexing
– port Server socket address
208.216.181.15:80
Client socket address
128.2.194.242:3479 FTP Server
(port 21)

Client HTTP Server

Connection socket pair (port 80)
(128.2.194.242:3479, 208.216.181.15:80)

Client host address Server host address

128.2.194.242 208.216.181.15
 Sockets
• How to use sockets
– Setup socket
• Where is the remote machine (IP address, hostname)
• What service gets the data (port)
– Send and Receive
• Designed just like any other I/O in unix
• send -- write
• recv -- read
– Close the socket
 Overview
Client Server

socket socket

bind open_listenfd
open_clientfd
listen
Connection
request
connect accept

write read
Client /
Server
Session read write

EOF
close read

close
 Step 1 – Setup Socket
• Both client and server need to setup the socket
– int socket(int domain, int type, int protocol);
• domain
– AF_INET -- IPv4 (AF_INET6 for IPv6)
• type
– SOCK_STREAM -- TCP
– SOCK_DGRAM -- UDP
• protocol
–0
• For example,
– int sockfd = socket(AF_INET, SOCK_STREAM, 0);
 Step 2 (Server) - Binding
• Only server need to bind
– int bind(int sockfd, const struct sockaddr *my_addr,
socklen_t addrlen);
• sockfd
– file descriptor socket() returned
• my_addr
– struct sockaddr_in for IPv4
– cast (struct sockaddr_in*) to (struct sockaddr*)
struct sockaddr_in {
short sin_family; // e.g. AF_INET
unsigned short sin_port; // e.g. htons(3490)
struct in_addr sin_addr; // see struct in_addr, below
char sin_zero[8]; // zero this if you want to
};
struct in_addr {
unsigned long s_addr; // load with inet_aton()
};
 What is that Cast?
• bind() takes in protocol-independent (struct
sockaddr*)
struct sockaddr {
unsigned short sa_family; // address family
char sa_data[14]; // protocol address
};

– C’s polymorphism
– There are structs for IPv6, etc.
 Step 2 (Server) - Binding contd.
• addrlen
– size of the sockaddr_in
struct sockaddr_in saddr;
int sockfd;
unsigned short port = 80;

if((sockfd=socket(AF_INET, SOCK_STREAM, 0) < 0) { // from back a couple slides

printf(“Error creating socket\n”);
...
}

memset(&saddr, '\0', sizeof(saddr)); // zero structure out

saddr.sin_family = AF_INET; // match the socket() call
saddr.sin_addr.s_addr = htonl(INADDR_ANY); // bind to any local address
saddr.sin_port = htons(port); // specify port to listen on

if((bind(sockfd, (struct sockaddr *) &saddr, sizeof(saddr)) < 0) { // bind!

printf(“Error binding\n”);
...
}
 What is htonl(), htons()?
• Byte ordering
– Network order is big-endian
– Host order can be big- or little-endian
• x86 is little-endian
• SPARC is big-endian
• Conversion
– htons(), htonl(): host to network short/long
– ntohs(), ntohl(): network order to host short/long
• What need to be converted?
– Addresses
– Port
– etc.
 Step 3 (Server) - Listen
• Now we can listen
– int listen(int sockfd, int backlog);
• sockfd
– again, file descriptor socket() returned
• backlog
– number of pending connections to queue
• For example,
– listen(sockfd, 5);
 Step 4 (Server) - Accept
• Server must explicitly accept incoming connections
– int accept(int sockfd, struct sockaddr *addr, socklen_t *addrlen)
• sockfd
– again... file descriptor socket() returned
• addr
– pointer to store client address, (struct sockaddr_in *) cast to
(struct sockaddr *)
• addrlen
– pointer to store the returned size of addr, should be
sizeof(*addr)
• For example
– int isock=accept(sockfd, (struct sockaddr_in *) &caddr, &clen);
 Put Server Together
struct sockaddr_in saddr, caddr;
int sockfd, clen, isock;
unsigned short port = 80;

if((sockfd=socket(AF_INET, SOCK_STREAM, 0) < 0) { // from back a couple slides

printf(“Error creating socket\n”);
...
}

memset(&saddr, '\0', sizeof(saddr)); // zero structure out

saddr.sin_family = AF_INET; // match the socket() call
saddr.sin_addr.s_addr = htonl(INADDR_ANY); // bind to any local address
saddr.sin_port = htons(port); // specify port to listen on

if((bind(sockfd, (struct sockaddr *) &saddr, sizeof(saddr)) < 0) { // bind!

printf(“Error binding\n”);
...
}

if(listen(sockfd, 5) < 0) { // listen for incoming connections

printf(“Error listening\n”);
...
}

clen=sizeof(caddr)
if((isock=accept(sockfd, (struct sockaddr *) &caddr, &clen)) < 0) { // accept one
printf(“Error accepting\n”);
...
}
 What about client?
• Client need not bind, listen, and accept
• All client need to do is to connect
– int connect(int sockfd, const struct sockaddr
*saddr, socklen_t addrlen);
• For example,
– connect(sockfd, (struct sockaddr *) &saddr,
sizeof(saddr));
 Domain Name System (DNS)
• What if I want to send data to “www.slashdot.org”?
– DNS: Conceptually, DNS is a database collection of host entries
struct hostent {
char *h_name; // official hostname
char **h_aliases; // vector of alternative hostnames
int h_addrtype; // address type, e.g. AF_INET
int h_length; // length of address in bytes, e.g. 4 for IPv4
char **h_addr_list; // vector of addresses
char *h_addr; // first host address, synonym for h_addr_list[0]
};

• hostname -> IP address

– struct hostent *gethostbyname(const char *name);

• IP address -> hostname

– struct hostent *gethostbyaddr(const char *addr, int len, int
type);
 Put Client Together
struct sockaddr_in saddr;
struct hostent *h;
int sockfd, connfd;
unsigned short port = 80;

if((sockfd=socket(AF_INET, SOCK_STREAM, 0) < 0) { // from back a couple slides

printf(“Error creating socket\n”);
...
}

if((h=gethostbyname(“www.slashdot.org”)) == NULL) { // Lookup the hostname

printf(“Unknown host\n”);
...
}

memset(&saddr, '\0', sizeof(saddr)); // zero structure out

saddr.sin_family = AF_INET; // match the socket() call
memcpy((char *) &saddr.sin_addr.s_addr, h->h_addr_list[0], h->h_length); // copy the address
saddr.sin_port = htons(port); // specify port to connect to

if((connfd=connect(sockfd, (struct sockaddr *) &saddr, sizeof(saddr)) < 0) { // connect!

printf(“Cannot connect\n”);
...
}
 We Are Connected
• Server accepting connections and client
connecting to servers
• Send and receive data
– ssize_t read(int fd, void *buf, size_t len);
– ssize_t write(int fd, const void *buf, size_t len);
• For example,
– read(sockfd, buffer, sizeof(buffer));
– write(sockfd, “hey\n”, strlen(“hey\n”));
 TCP Framing
• TCP does NOT guarantee message boundaries
– IRC commands are terminated by a newline
– But you may not get one at the end of read(), e.g.
• One Send “Hello\n”
• Multiple Receives “He”, “llo\n”
– If you don’t get the entire line from one read(),
use a buffer
 Revisited
Client Server

socket socket

bind open_listenfd
open_clientfd
listen
Connection
request
connect accept

write read
Client /
Server
Session read write

EOF
close read

close
 Close the Socket
• Don’t forget to close the socket descriptor,
like a file
– int close(int sockfd);

• Now server can loop around and accept a new

connection when the old one finishes
• What’s wrong here?
 Server Flaw
client 1 server client 2
call accept
call connect
ret connect
ret accept
call fgets
Server blocks call read call connect
User goes waiting for
out to lunch data from
Client 2 blocks
Client 1
waiting to complete
Client 1 blocks its connection
waiting for user request until after
to type in data lunch!

Taken from D. Murray, R. Bryant, and G. Langale 15-441/213 slides

 Concurrent Servers
client 1 server client 2
call accept call connect
call connect
ret connect
ret accept
call fgets call read (don’t block)

call accept
User goes ret connect
out to lunch ret accept call fgets

write
Client 1
blocks call read call read
waiting for
user to type write
in data
end read
close
close

Taken from D. Murray, R. Bryant, and G. Langale 15-441/213 slides

 Concurrency
• Threading
– Easier to understand
– Race conditions increase complexity
• Select()
– Explicit control flows, no race conditions
– Explicit control more complicated
• There is no clear winner, but you MUST use
select()…
 What is select()?
• Monitor multiple descriptors
• How does it work?
– Setup sets of sockets to monitor
– select(): blocking until something happens
– “Something” could be
• Incoming connection: accept()
• Clients sending data: read()
• Pending data to send: write()
• Timeout
 Concurrency – Step 1
• Allowing address reuse
int sock, opts=1;

sock = socket(...); // To give you an idea of where the new code goes

setsockopt(sock, SOL_SOCKET, SO_REUSEADDR, &opts, sizeof(opts));

• Then we set the sockets to be non-blocking

if((opts = fcntl(sock, F_GETFL)) < 0) { // Get current options
printf(“Error...\n”);
...
}
opts = (opts | O_NONBLOCK); // Don't clobber your old settings
if(fcntl(sock, F_SETFL, opts) < 0) {
printf(“Error...\n”);
...
}

bind(...); // To again give you an idea where the new code goes
 Concurrency – Step 2
• Monitor sockets with select()
– int select(int maxfd, fd_set *readfds, fd_set *writefds,
fd_set *exceptfds, const struct timespec *timeout);
• maxfd
– max file descriptor + 1
• fd_set: bit vector with FD_SETSIZE bits
– readfds: bit vector of read descriptors to monitor
– writefds: bit vector of write descriptors to monitor
– exceptfds: set to NULL
• timeout
– how long to wait without activity before returning
 What about bit vectors?
• void FD_ZERO(fd_set *fdset);
– clear out all bits
• void FD_SET(int fd, fd_set *fdset);
– set one bit
• void FD_CLR(int fd, fd_set *fdset);
– clear one bit
• int FD_ISSET(int fd, fd_set *fdset);
– test whether fd bit is set
 The Server
// socket() call and non-blocking code is above this point

if((bind(sockfd, (struct sockaddr *) &saddr, sizeof(saddr)) < 0) { // bind!

printf(“Error binding\n”);
...
}

if(listen(sockfd, 5) < 0) { // listen for incoming connections

printf(“Error listening\n”);
...
}

clen=sizeof(caddr);

// Setup pool.read_set with an FD_ZERO() and FD_SET() for

// your server socket file descriptor. (whatever socket() returned)

while(1) {
pool.ready_set = pool.read_set; // Save the current state
pool.nready = select(pool.maxfd+1, &pool.ready_set, &pool.write_set, NULL, NULL);

if(FD_ISSET(sockfd, &pool.ready_set)) { // Check if there is an incoming conn

isock=accept(sockfd, (struct sockaddr *) &caddr, &clen); // accept it
add_client(isock, &pool); // add the client by the incoming socket fd
}

check_clients(&pool); // check if any data needs to be sent/received from clients

}

...

close(sockfd);
 What is pool?
typedef struct { /* represents a pool of connected descriptors */
int maxfd; /* largest descriptor in read_set */
fd_set read_set; /* set of all active read descriptors */
fd_set write_set; /* set of all active read descriptors */
fd_set ready_set; /* subset of descriptors ready for reading */
int nready; /* number of ready descriptors from select */
int maxi; /* highwater index into client array */
int clientfd[FD_SETSIZE]; /* set of active descriptors */
rio_t clientrio[FD_SETSIZE]; /* set of active read buffers */
... // ADD WHAT WOULD BE HELPFUL FOR PROJECT1
} pool;
 What about checking clients?
• The main loop only tests for incoming connections
– There are other reasons the server wakes up
– Clients are sending data, pending data to write to
buffer, clients closing connections, etc.
• Store all client file descriptors
– in pool
• Keep the while(1) loop thin
– Delegate to functions
• Come up with your own design
 Summary
• Sockets
– socket setup
– I/O
– close
• Client: socket()----------------------->connect()->I/O->close()
• Server: socket()->bind()->listen()->accept()--->I/O->close()

• DNS
– gethostbyname()
• Concurrency
– select()
• Bit vector operations
– fd_set, FD_ZERO(), FD_SET(), FD_CLR(), FD_ISSET()
 About Project 1
• Standalone IRC server
– Checkpoint 1: subversion and Makefile
• Check in a Makefile and source code
• Makefile can build executable named sircd
• No server functions necessary
– Checkpoint 2: echo server
• Use select() to handle multiple clients
 Suggestions
• Start early!
– Work ahead of checkpoints
• Read the man pages
• Email (xil at cs dot cmu dot edu) if you didn’t
get a svn username and password