# \[ANN\] Mongrel 0.3.13 Pre-Release -- Caulking Release **URL:** \ **Category:** Rails\ **Created:** [June 15, 2006, 9:08pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ann-mongrel-0-3-13-pre-release-caulking-release/63519 "2006-06-15T21:08:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Zed\_S](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/z/da6949/32.png) [@Zed\_S](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Zed_S)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2006, 9:08pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ann-mongrel-0-3-13-pre-release-caulking-release/63519/1 "2006-06-15T21:08:53Z")
Hello Everyone, Francois S. inadvertently found a way to replicate a rare but deadly bug right as I was working up the official release of Mongrel 0.3.13. This bug only happened to a few people, but thanks to the wonderful fuzzing tool Apache Bench[1] he could replicate the slow select starvation people were seeing. TESTING This bug is now fixed in the current pre-release, and I’d like everyone to grab it in the usual way: $ gem install mongrel --source=[http://mongrel.rubyforge.org/releases/](http://mongrel.rubyforge.org/releases/) And run Francois little mongrel killer script (in a bash shell): while true; do ab -n 1000 -c 30 [http://localhost:3000/](http://localhost:3000/) 2\>/dev/null | grep quest.\*mean ; echo – ; done You will need Apache Bench for this to work. Specifically hit this against a file and potentially a Rails action or two. Also try varying the -c option to higher levels. EXPECTED RESULTS You will probably see a bunch of Broken Pipe or other errors when you hit files, but otherwise you should see the same performance for the same -c settings. If you see the performance degrade over time (very quickly) then shoot me an e-mail with the errors you see and the operating system you use. OFFICIAL RELEASE If nobody has problems with this release then I’ll make it official tonight. BUG DESCRIPTION In general, if you are using Ruby threads and a socket produces an error, then _don’t use that socket anymore_. Turns out that Ruby will happily let you continue using the socket, but most OS select() functions have strange semantics with dead sockets. In this case, Ruby is most likely waiting for a read or write event on the socket, but since it’s dead there will be none. On most operating systems this turns out to put any thread that uses that socket into a permanently sleeping state. What _should_ happen is that any socket that throws an exception should be put into an invalid state so that further operations on it blow up and then any invalid sockets are not put into the select loop for threads. I’ve got tests going which exercise this bug and have refactored all of the socket usage so that exceptions are detected and the socket isn’t used anymore after that. Hopefully this squashes it permanently. Thanks for the help. – Zed A. Shaw > **[Zed A. shaw](https://zedshaw.com/)** > > Personal essays and writings by Zed A. Shaw. [http://mongrel.rubyforge.org/](http://mongrel.rubyforge.org/) [1] Apache Bench is the worst piece of crap on the planet. The reason this bug shows up is because ab actually violently closes sockets on any connections that “take too long”. It of course doesn’t define what “too long” is and doesn’t tell you it’s going to do this. Use httperf. This behavior is available with httperf but you have to turn it on explicitly. If you need to see what happens when really nasty clients hit your server in the thousands, then use ab. Otherwise it’s performance measurements are total crap since it can’t possibly be getting an accurate reading if it’s closing most of the sockets. ---
**Author:** ![Zed\_S](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/z/da6949/32.png) [@Zed\_S](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Zed_S)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2006, 9:24pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ann-mongrel-0-3-13-pre-release-caulking-release/63519/2 "2006-06-15T21:24:31Z")
Caulking Release? Is this still Enterprisey ready? 😜 Joe ---
**Author:** ![Zed\_S](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/z/da6949/32.png) [@Zed\_S](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Zed_S)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2006, 3:16pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ann-mongrel-0-3-13-pre-release-caulking-release/63519/3 "2006-06-16T15:16:56Z")
Zed S. wrote: > If nobody has problems with this release then I’ll make it official > tonight. How did the testing go? I’m just getting my new Mac systems up and running and looking forward to dropping Mongrel on them. ---
**Author:** ![Zed\_S](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/z/da6949/32.png) [@Zed\_S](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Zed_S)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2006, 12:58am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ann-mongrel-0-3-13-pre-release-caulking-release/63519/4 "2006-06-17T00:58:43Z")
On Fri, 2006-06-16 at 15:16 +0200, Roy Jenkins wrote: > Zed S. wrote: > > > If nobody has problems with this release then I’ll make it official > > tonight. > > How did the testing go? I’m just getting my new Mac systems up and > running and looking forward to dropping Mongrel on them. So far so good. I’ve got a fresh little pre-release that fixes up some of the logging and outputs, and prints a warning if you run mongrel in daemon mode twice. Just now trying the install on Mac OSX, and finished win32. I’m looking to have it out in about an hour unless something horrible comes up. – Zed A. Shaw > **[Zed A. shaw](https://zedshaw.com/)** > > Personal essays and writings by Zed A. Shaw. [http://mongrel.rubyforge.org/](http://mongrel.rubyforge.org/)