# How to control the time while ruby connect to oracle?

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/how-to-control-the-time-while-ruby-connect-to-oracle/156866>\
**Category:** Ruby\
**Created:** [January 4, 2009, 3:20pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/how-to-control-the-time-while-ruby-connect-to-oracle/156866 "2009-01-04T15:20:02Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![zanetsang](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/z/ecccb3/32.png) [@zanetsang](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/zanetsang)\
**Post date:** [January 4, 2009, 3:20pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/how-to-control-the-time-while-ruby-connect-to-oracle/156866/1 "2009-01-04T15:20:02Z")

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Hi,I really need your help.I have a program when I use ruby to conncet  
oralcle DB.My code is(testdb.rb):

require ‘rubygems’  
require ‘dbi’  
puts “Begin Conn!”  
dbh=DBI.connect(‘DBI:OCI8:orcl’,‘sgpm’,‘sgpm’)  
puts “connect db is OK!”  
dbh.disconnect

My system is solaris,usually,when i input:“ruby testdb.rb” in the  
terimnate it will print connect db is OK! quickly,but sometimes when it  
print “Begin Conn”,the system will wait for several minutes then have  
the follow message:  
env.c:257:in oci8lib.so: ORA-12170: TNS:Connect timeout occurred  
(DBI::DatabaseError)  
from /usr/local/lib/ruby/site\_ruby/1.8/oci8.rb:229:in  
`initialize' from /usr/local/lib/ruby/site_ruby/1.8/DBD/OCI8/OCI8.rb:156:in`new’  
from /usr/local/lib/ruby/site\_ruby/1.8/DBD/OCI8/OCI8.rb:156:in  
`connect' from /usr/local/lib/ruby/site_ruby/1.8/dbi.rb:448:in`connect’  
from /usr/local/lib/ruby/site\_ruby/1.8/dbi.rb:221:in `connect’  
from testdb.rb:7

I have tried to use timeout() function to contorl the time,but it has no  
use.  
can you help me?(i want to control the code to excute in 5 secs,when it  
didn’t connect to DB in 5 seconds,then it should exit.)  
Thanks very much!!!

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![zanetsang](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/z/ecccb3/32.png) [@zanetsang](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/zanetsang)\
**Post date:** [January 5, 2009, 3:28pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/how-to-control-the-time-while-ruby-connect-to-oracle/156866/2 "2009-01-05T15:28:10Z")

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Hi,

On Sun, Jan 4, 2009 at 11:18 PM, Zane T. [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid)  
wrote:

> My system is solaris,usually,when i input:“ruby testdb.rb” in the  
> terimnate it will print connect db is OK! quickly,but sometimes when it  
> print “Begin Conn”,the system will wait for several minutes then have  
> the follow message:  
> env.c:257:in oci8lib.so: ORA-12170: TNS:Connect timeout occurred  
> (DBI::DatabaseError)  
> (snip)  
> I have tried to use timeout() function to contorl the time,but it has no  
> use.

Timeout.rb doesn’t work when it is blocked in a C function.  
Ruby-oci8 has non-blocking mode. But it is for established connections.  
There is no way when establishing a connection as long as ruby’s thread  
model is green.

> can you help me?(i want to control the code to excute in 5 secs,when it  
> didn’t connect to DB in 5 seconds,then it should exit.)

If your platform is UNIX variant, here is a terrible workaround:  
kill the process when it cannot connect to the server in 5 seconds.

testdb.rb:  
require ‘rubygems’  
require ‘dbi’  
notify\_target\_pid = ARGV[0].to\_i  
puts “Begin Conn!”  
dbh=DBI.connect(‘DBI:OCI8:orcl’,‘sgpm’,‘sgpm’)  
puts “connect db is OK!”  
Process.kill(“HUP”, notify\_target\_pid) # notify that a connection  
is established.  
dbh.disconnect

timeout.sh:  
trap caught\_signal=1 1 # trap HUP signal to set caught\_signal.  
ruby -Ilib -Iext/oci8 testdb.rb $$ & # when a connection is  
established, HUP signal is sent.  
ruby\_process\_pid=$!  
sleep 5  
if test -z “$caught\_signal”; then  
echo HUP signal has not been caught in 5 seconds.  
echo kill the process.  
kill -9 $ruby\_process\_pid  
fi  
wait $ruby\_process\_pid