gateway_base.py

the code of this module is sent to the “other side” as a means of bootstrapping a Gateway object capable of receiving and executing code, and routing data through channels.

Gateways operate on InputOutput objects offering a write and a read(n) method.

Once bootstrapped a higher level protocol based on Messages is used. Messages are serialized to and from InputOutput objects. The details of this protocol are locally defined in this module. There is no need for standardizing or versioning the protocol.

After bootstrapping the BaseGateway opens a receiver thread which accepts encoded messages and triggers actions to interpret them. Sending of channel data items happens directly through write operations to InputOutput objects so there is no separate thread.

Code execution messages are put into an execqueue from which they will be taken for execution. gateway.serve() will take and execute such items, one by one. This means that by incoming default execution is single-threaded.

The receiver thread terminates if the remote side sends a gateway termination message or if the IO-connection drops. It puts an end symbol into the execqueue so that serve() can cleanly finish as well.