I'm having an issue with ZeroMQ, which I believe is because I'm not very familiar with it.
I'm trying to build a very simple service where multiple clients connect to a server and sends a query. The server responds to this query.
When I use REQ-REP socket combination (client using REQ, server binding to a REP socket) I'm able to get close to 60,000 messages per second at server side (when client and server are on the same machine). When distributed across machines, each new instance of client on a different machine linearly increases the messages per second at the server and easily reaches 40,000+ with enough client instances.
Now REP socket is blocking, so I followed ZeroMQ guide and used the rrbroker pattern (http://zguide.zeromq.org/cs:rrbroker):
REQ (client) <----> [server ROUTER -- DEALER --- REP (workers running on different threads)]
However, this completely screws up the performance. I'm getting only around 4000 messages per second at the server when running across machines. Not only that, each new client started on a different machine reduces the throughput of every other client.
I'm pretty sure I'm doing something stupid. I'm wondering if ZeroMQ experts here can point out any obvious mistakes. Thanks!
Edit: Adding code as per advice. I'm using the clrzmq nuget package (https://www.nuget.org/packages/clrzmq-x64/)
Here's the client code. A timer counts how many responses are received every second.
for (int i = 0; i < numTasks; i++) { Task.Factory.StartNew(() => Client(), TaskCreationOptions.LongRunning); }
void Client()
{
using (var ctx = new Context())
{
Socket socket = ctx.Socket(SocketType.REQ);
socket.Connect("tcp://192.168.1.10:1234");
while (true)
{
socket.Send("ping", Encoding.Unicode);
string res = socket.Recv(Encoding.Unicode);
}
}
}
Server - case 1: The server keeps track of how many requests are received per second
using (var zmqContext = new Context())
{
Socket socket = zmqContext.Socket(SocketType.REP);
socket.Bind("tcp://*:1234");
while (true)
{
string q = socket.Recv(Encoding.Unicode);
if (q.CompareTo("ping") == 0) {
socket.Send("pong", Encoding.Unicode);
}
}
}
With this setup, at server side, I can see around 60,000 requests received per second (when client is on the same machine). When on different machines, each new client increases number of requests received at server as expected.
Server Case 2: This is essentially rrbroker from ZMQ guide.
void ReceiveMessages(Context zmqContext, string zmqConnectionString, int numWorkers)
{
List<PollItem> pollItemsList = new List<PollItem>();
routerSocket = zmqContext.Socket(SocketType.ROUTER);
try
{
routerSocket.Bind(zmqConnectionString);
PollItem pollItem = routerSocket.CreatePollItem(IOMultiPlex.POLLIN);
pollItem.PollInHandler += RouterSocket_PollInHandler;
pollItemsList.Add(pollItem);
}
catch (ZMQ.Exception ze)
{
Console.WriteLine("{0}", ze.Message);
return;
}
dealerSocket = zmqContext.Socket(SocketType.DEALER);
try
{
dealerSocket.Bind("inproc://workers");
PollItem pollItem = dealerSocket.CreatePollItem(IOMultiPlex.POLLIN);
pollItem.PollInHandler += DealerSocket_PollInHandler;
pollItemsList.Add(pollItem);
}
catch (ZMQ.Exception ze)
{
Console.WriteLine("{0}", ze.Message);
return;
}
// Start the worker pool; cant connect
// to inproc socket before binding.
workerPool.Start(numWorkers);
while (true)
{
zmqContext.Poll(pollItemsList.ToArray());
}
}
void RouterSocket_PollInHandler(Socket socket, IOMultiPlex revents)
{
RelayMessage(routerSocket, dealerSocket);
}
void DealerSocket_PollInHandler(Socket socket, IOMultiPlex revents)
{
RelayMessage(dealerSocket, routerSocket);
}
void RelayMessage(Socket source, Socket destination)
{
bool hasMore = true;
while (hasMore)
{
byte[] message = source.Recv();
hasMore = source.RcvMore;
destination.Send(message, message.Length, hasMore ? SendRecvOpt.SNDMORE : SendRecvOpt.NONE);
}
}
Where the worker pool's start method is:
public void Start(int numWorkerTasks=8)
{
for (int i = 0; i < numWorkerTasks; i++)
{
QueryWorker worker = new QueryWorker(this.zmqContext);
Task task = Task.Factory.StartNew(() =>
worker.Start(),
TaskCreationOptions.LongRunning);
}
Console.WriteLine("Started {0} with {1} workers.", this.GetType().Name, numWorkerTasks);
}
public class QueryWorker
{
Context zmqContext;
public QueryWorker(Context zmqContext)
{
this.zmqContext = zmqContext;
}
public void Start()
{
Socket socket = this.zmqContext.Socket(SocketType.REP);
try
{
socket.Connect("inproc://workers");
}
catch (ZMQ.Exception ze)
{
Console.WriteLine("Could not create worker, error: {0}", ze.Message);
return;
}
while (true)
{
try
{
string message = socket.Recv(Encoding.Unicode);
if (message.CompareTo("ping") == 0)
{
socket.Send("pong", Encoding.Unicode);
}
}
catch (ZMQ.Exception ze)
{
Console.WriteLine("Could not receive message, error: " + ze.ToString());
}
}
}
}
