fiery is using an event-based model to allow you to program the
logic. During the life cycle of an app a range of different events will
be triggered and it is possible to add event handlers to these using the
on() method. An event handler is simply a function that
will get called every time an event is fired. Apart from the predefined
life cycle events it is also possible to trigger custom events using the
trigger() method. Manual triggering of life cycle events is
not allowed.
Following is a list of all life cycle events. These cannot be triggered manually, but is fired as part of the normal lifetime of a fiery server:
start: Will trigger once when the app is started but
before it is running. The handlers will receive the app itself as the
server argument as well as any argument passed on from the
ignite() method. Any return value is discarded.resume: Will trigger once after the start event if the
app has been started using the reignite() method. The
handlers will receive the app itself as the server argument
as well as any argument passed on from the reignite()
method. Any return value is discarded.end: Will trigger once after the app is stopped. The
handlers will receive the app itself as the server
argument. Any return value is discarded.cycle-start: Will trigger in the beginning of each
loop, before the request queue is flushed. The handlers will receive the
app itself as the server argument. Any return value is
discarded.cycle-end: Will trigger in the end of each loop, after
the request queue is flushed and all delayed, timed, and asynchronous
calls have been executed. The handlers will receive the app itself as
the server argument. Any return value is discarded.header: Will trigger every time the header of a request
is received. The return value of the last called handler is used to
determine if further processing of the request will be done. If the
return value is TRUE the request will continue on to normal
processing. If the return value is FALSE the response will
be send back and the connection will be closed without retrieving the
payload. The handlers will receive the app itself as the
server argument, the client id as the id
argument and the request object as the request
argument.before-request: Will trigger prior to handling of a
request (that is, every time a request is received unless it is
short-circuited by the header handlers). The return values
of the handlers will be passed on to the request handlers and can thus
be used to inject data into the request handlers (e.g. session specific
data). The handlers will receive the app itself as the
server argument, the client id as the id
argument and the request object as the request
argument.request: Will trigger after the
before-request event. This is where the main request
handling is done. The return value of the last handler is send back to
the client as response. If no handler is registered a 404
error is returned automatically. If the return value is not a valid
response, a 500 server error is returned instead. The
handlers will receive the app itself as the server
argument, the client id as the id argument, the request
object as the request argument, and the list of values
created by the before-event handlers as the arg_list
argument.after-request: Will trigger after the
request event. This can be used to inspect the response
(but not modify it) before it is send to the client. The handlers will
receive the app itself as the server argument, the client
id as the id argument, the request object as the
request argument, and the response as the
response argument. Any return value is discarded.before-message: This event is triggered when a
websocket message is received. As with the before-request
event the return values of the handlers are passed on to the
message handlers. Specifically if a 'binary'
and 'message' value is returned they will override the
original values in the message and
after-message handler arguments. This can e.g. be used to
decode the message once before passing it through the
message handlers. The before-message handlers
will receive the app itself as the server argument, the
client id as the id argument, a flag indicating whether the
message is binary as the binary argument, the message
itself as the message argument, and the request object used
to establish the connection with the client as the request
argument.message: This event is triggered after the
before-message event and is used for the primary websocket
message handling. As with the request event, the handlers
for the message event receives the return values from the
before-message handlers which can be used to e.g. inject
session specific data. The message handlers will receive the app itself
as the server argument, the client id as the
id argument, a flag indicating whether the message is
binary as the binary argument, the message itself as the
message argument, the request object used to establish the
connection with the client as the request argument, and the
values returned by the before-message handlers as the
arg_list argument. Contrary to the request
event the return values of the handlers are ignored as websocket
communication is bidirectional.after-message: This event is triggered after the
message event. It is provided more as an equivalent to the
after-request event than out of necessity as there is no
final response to inspect and handler can thus just as well be attached
to the message event. For clear division of server logic,
message specific handlers should be attached to the message
event, whereas general handlers should, if possible, be attached to the
after-message event. The after-message
handlers will receive the app itself as the server
argument, the client id as the id argument, a flag
indicating whether the message is binary as the binary
argument, the message itself as the message argument, and
the request object used to establish the connection with the client as
the request argument.send: This event is triggered after a websocket message
is send to a client. The handlers will receive the app itself as the
server argument, the client id as the id
argument and the send message as the message argument. Any
return value is discarded.websocket-closed: This event will be triggered every
time a websocket connection is closed. The handlers will receive the app
itself as the server argument, the client id as the
id argument and request used to establish the closed
connection as the request argument. Any return value is
discarded.Apart from the predefined events, it is also possible to trigger and listen to custom events. The syntax is as follows:
# Add a handler to the 'new-event' event
id <- app$on('new-event', function() {
message('Event fired')
})
# Trigger the event
app$trigger('new-event')
# Remove the handler
app$off(id)Additional parameters passed on to the trigger() method
will be passed on to the handler. There is no limit to the number of
handlers that can be attached to custom events. When an event is
triggered they will simply be called in the order they have been added.
Triggering a non-existing event is not an error, so plugins are free to
fire off events without worrying about whether handlers have been
added.
If a fiery server is running in blocking mode it is not possible to
communicate with it using the trigger() method (though
these can be fired by other callbacks in the server logic). Instead it
is possible to assign a directory to look in for event trigger
instructions. The trigger directory is set using the
trigger_dir field, e.g.:
Events are triggered by placing an rds file named after
the event in the trigger directory. The file must contain a list, and
the elements of the list will be passed on as arguments to the event
handlers. After the event has been triggered the file will be deleted.
The following command will trigger the external-event on a
server looking in '/some/path/to/dir/':