.TH qlibs: iopause 3
.SH NAME
iopause \- stateful handling of events based on the poll interface or file descriptors
.SH SYNTAX
.B #include \(dqioause.h\(dq

int \fBiopause\fP(iopause_fd *\fIx\fR,unsigned int \fIlen\fR,struct taia *\fIdeadline\f$,struct taia *\fIstamp\fR);
.SH DESCRIPTION
.B iopause 
checks for file descriptor readability or writeability as specified
by \fIx\fR[0].fd, \fIx\fR[0].events, \fIx\fR[1].fd, \fIx\fR[1].events, ..., \fIx\fR[\fIlen\fR-1].fd,
\fIx\fR[\fIlen\fR-1].events. If \fIx\fR[i].events includes the bit IOPAUSE_READ, 
.B iopause
checks for readability of the descriptor \fIx\fR[i].fd; 
if \fIx\fR[i].events includes the bit IOPAUSE_WRITE, 
.B iopause 
checks for writability of the descriptor
\fIx\fR[i].fd; other bits in \fIx\fR[i].events have undefined effects.

.B iopause 
sets the IOPAUSE_READ bit in \fIx\fR[i].revents if it finds that \fIx\fR[i].fd
is readabled and it sets the IOPAUSE_WRITE bit in \fIx\fR[i].revents if it finds
that \fIx\fR[i].fd is writable. 
Beware that readability and writeability may be destroyed at any moment 
by other processes with access to the same file \fIx\fR[i].fd refers to.

If there is no readability or writeability to report, 
.B iopause 
waits until \fIdeadline\fR for something to happen. 
.B iopause 
will return before \fIdeadline\fR if a
descriptor becomes readable or writeable, or an interrupting signal
arrives, or some system-defined amount of time passes. 
.B iopause 
sets
.I revents 
in any case.

You must put a current timestamp into \fIstamp\fR before calling 
.BR iopause .
In case the the current timestamp is older than the previous one (ie. due to daylight-saving)
negative values are omitted. 

.SH "IMPLEMENTATION NOTES"
The current implementation of 
.B iopause 
uses the \fBpoll\fR interface if that is available. 
On some systems, \fBpoll\fR needs to dynamically allocate kernel
memory. In case not enough memory is available, 
.B iopause 
will return immediately and will report (often incorrectly) that no descriptors are
readable or writeable. 

If the \fBpoll\fR interface is not available, 
.B iopause 
uses the \fBselect\fR function. This function
cannot see descriptor numbers past a system-defined limit, typically 256
or 1024; 
.I iopause 
will artificially pretend that those descriptors are never readable or writeable.

Future implementations of 
.B iopause 
may work around these problems on some
systems, at the expense of chewing up all available CPU time.

Both \fBpoll\fR and \fBselect\fR use relative timeouts rather than absolute deadlines.
Some kernels round the timeout down to a multiple of 10 milliseconds; this
can burn quite a bit of CPU time as the deadline approaches. 
.B iopause
compensates for this by adding 20 milliseconds to the timeout.
In case the current timestamp is older than the previous one (ie. due to daylight-saving)
the timeout is set to 20 milliseconds.
.SH "RETURN CODES"
.B iopause 
reads and deploys the return codes of the
.I poll 
and 
.I select 
call. Only positive return values shall be considered by the calling routines for a succcessful 
invocation.
.SH CREDITS
Parts of the description are taken from the 'libowfat' man page.
.SH "SEE ALSO"
select(2), 
poll(3), 
taia(3)