withFramedSink(): Don't use a thread to monitor the other side

Since withFramedSink() is now used a lot more than in the past (for
every addToStore() variant), we were creating a lot of threads, e.g.

  nix flake show --no-eval-cache --all-systems github:NixOS/nix/afdd12be5e19c0001ff3297dea544301108d298

would create 46418 threads. While threads on Linux are cheap, this is
still substantial overhead.

So instead, just poll from FramedSink before every write whether there
are pending messages from the daemon. This could slightly increase the
latency on log messages from the daemon, but not on exceptions (which
were only synchronously checked from FramedSink anyway).

This speeds up the command above from 19.2s to 17.5s on my machine (a
9% speedup).

src/libstore/remote-store-connection.hh

@@ -49,7 +49,7 @@ struct RemoteStore::ConnectionHandle
     RemoteStore::Connection & operator * () { return *handle; }
     RemoteStore::Connection * operator -> () { return &*handle; }
 
-    void processStderr(Sink * sink = 0, Source * source = 0, bool flush = true);
+    void processStderr(Sink * sink = 0, Source * source = 0, bool flush = true, bool block = true);
 
     void withFramedSink(std::function<void(Sink & sink)> fun);
 };

src/libstore/remote-store.cc

@@ -153,9 +153,9 @@ RemoteStore::ConnectionHandle::~ConnectionHandle()
     }
 }
 
-void RemoteStore::ConnectionHandle::processStderr(Sink * sink, Source * source, bool flush)
+void RemoteStore::ConnectionHandle::processStderr(Sink * sink, Source * source, bool flush, bool block)
 {
-    handle->processStderr(&daemonException, sink, source, flush);
+    handle->processStderr(&daemonException, sink, source, flush, block);
 }
 
 
@@ -926,43 +926,17 @@ void RemoteStore::ConnectionHandle::withFramedSink(std::function<void(Sink & sin
 {
     (*this)->to.flush();
 
-    std::exception_ptr ex;
-
-    /* Handle log messages / exceptions from the remote on a separate
-       thread. */
-    std::thread stderrThread([&]()
     {
-        try {
-            ReceiveInterrupts receiveInterrupts;
-            processStderr(nullptr, nullptr, false);
-        } catch (...) {
-            ex = std::current_exception();
-        }
-    });
-
-    Finally joinStderrThread([&]()
-    {
-        if (stderrThread.joinable()) {
-            stderrThread.join();
-            if (ex) {
-                try {
-                    std::rethrow_exception(ex);
-                } catch (...) {
-                    ignoreException();
-                }
-            }
-        }
-    });
-
-    {
-        FramedSink sink((*this)->to, ex);
+        FramedSink sink((*this)->to, [&]() {
+            /* Periodically process stderr messages and exceptions
+               from the daemon. */
+            processStderr(nullptr, nullptr, false, false);
+        });
         fun(sink);
         sink.flush();
     }
 
-    stderrThread.join();
-    if (ex)
-        std::rethrow_exception(ex);
+    processStderr(nullptr, nullptr, false);
 }
 
 }

src/libstore/worker-protocol-connection.cc

@@ -32,7 +32,8 @@ static Logger::Fields readFields(Source & from)
     return fields;
 }
 
-std::exception_ptr WorkerProto::BasicClientConnection::processStderrReturn(Sink * sink, Source * source, bool flush)
+std::exception_ptr
+WorkerProto::BasicClientConnection::processStderrReturn(Sink * sink, Source * source, bool flush, bool block)
 {
     if (flush)
         to.flush();
@@ -41,6 +42,9 @@ std::exception_ptr WorkerProto::BasicClientConnection::processStderrReturn(Sink
 
     while (true) {
 
+        if (!block && !from.hasData())
+            break;
+
         auto msg = readNum<uint64_t>(from);
 
         if (msg == STDERR_WRITE) {
@@ -95,8 +99,10 @@ std::exception_ptr WorkerProto::BasicClientConnection::processStderrReturn(Sink
             logger->result(act, type, fields);
         }
 
-        else if (msg == STDERR_LAST)
+        else if (msg == STDERR_LAST) {
+            assert(block);
             break;
+        }
 
         else
             throw Error("got unknown message type %x from Nix daemon", msg);
@@ -130,9 +136,10 @@ std::exception_ptr WorkerProto::BasicClientConnection::processStderrReturn(Sink
     }
 }
 
-void WorkerProto::BasicClientConnection::processStderr(bool * daemonException, Sink * sink, Source * source, bool flush)
+void WorkerProto::BasicClientConnection::processStderr(
+    bool * daemonException, Sink * sink, Source * source, bool flush, bool block)
 {
-    auto ex = processStderrReturn(sink, source, flush);
+    auto ex = processStderrReturn(sink, source, flush, block);
     if (ex) {
         *daemonException = true;
         std::rethrow_exception(ex);

src/libstore/worker-protocol-connection.hh

@@ -70,9 +70,10 @@ struct WorkerProto::BasicClientConnection : WorkerProto::BasicConnection
 
     virtual void closeWrite() = 0;
 
-    std::exception_ptr processStderrReturn(Sink * sink = 0, Source * source = 0, bool flush = true);
+    std::exception_ptr processStderrReturn(Sink * sink = 0, Source * source = 0, bool flush = true, bool block = true);
 
-    void processStderr(bool * daemonException, Sink * sink = 0, Source * source = 0, bool flush = true);
+    void
+    processStderr(bool * daemonException, Sink * sink = 0, Source * source = 0, bool flush = true, bool block = true);
 
     /**
      * Establishes connection, negotiating version.

src/libutil/serialise.cc

@@ -10,6 +10,8 @@
 #ifdef _WIN32
 # include <fileapi.h>
 # include "windows-error.hh"
+#else
+# include <poll.h>
 #endif
 
 
@@ -158,6 +160,24 @@ bool FdSource::good()
 }
 
 
+bool FdSource::hasData()
+{
+    if (BufferedSource::hasData()) return true;
+
+    while (true) {
+        struct pollfd fds[1];
+        fds[0].fd = fd;
+        fds[0].events = POLLIN;
+        auto n = poll(fds, 1, 0);
+        if (n < 0) {
+            if (errno == EINTR) continue;
+            throw SysError("polling file descriptor");
+        }
+        return n == 1 && (fds[0].events & POLLIN);
+    }
+}
+
+
 size_t StringSource::read(char * data, size_t len)
 {
     if (pos == s.size()) throw EndOfFile("end of string reached");

src/libutil/serialise.hh

@@ -104,6 +104,9 @@ struct BufferedSource : Source
 
     size_t read(char * data, size_t len) override;
 
+    /**
+     * Return true if the buffer is not empty.
+     */
     bool hasData();
 
 protected:
@@ -162,6 +165,13 @@ struct FdSource : BufferedSource
     FdSource & operator=(FdSource && s) = default;
 
     bool good() override;
+
+    /**
+     * Return true if the buffer is not empty after a non-blocking
+     * read.
+     */
+    bool hasData();
+
 protected:
     size_t readUnbuffered(char * data, size_t len) override;
 private:
@@ -522,15 +532,16 @@ struct FramedSource : Source
 /**
  * Write as chunks in the format expected by FramedSource.
  *
- * The exception_ptr reference can be used to terminate the stream when you
- * detect that an error has occurred on the remote end.
+ * The `checkError` function can be used to terminate the stream when you
+ * detect that an error has occurred.
  */
 struct FramedSink : nix::BufferedSink
 {
     BufferedSink & to;
-    std::exception_ptr & ex;
+    std::function<void()> checkError;
 
-    FramedSink(BufferedSink & to, std::exception_ptr & ex) : to(to), ex(ex)
+    FramedSink(BufferedSink & to, std::function<void()> && checkError)
+        : to(to), checkError(checkError)
     { }
 
     ~FramedSink()
@@ -545,13 +556,9 @@ struct FramedSink : nix::BufferedSink
 
     void writeUnbuffered(std::string_view data) override
     {
-        /* Don't send more data if the remote has
-            encountered an error. */
-        if (ex) {
-            auto ex2 = ex;
-            ex = nullptr;
-            std::rethrow_exception(ex2);
-        }
+        /* Don't send more data if an error has occured. */
+        checkError();
+
         to << data.size();
         to(data);
     };