Pthread

Module Pthread provides possibility for Ruby to run pieces of code in parallel using additional Unix processes on the same or other machines in the network.

Add this line to your application's Gemfile:

gem 'pthread'

And then execute:

$ bundle

Or install it yourself as:

$ gem install pthread

Before using parallel threads you should configure a dRb server:

Pthread::Pthread.start_service '192.168.1.100:12345'

Pthreads are actual Unix processes. You can add process-workers on the same machine as the main programm by calling:

Pthread::Pthread.add_executor 'tasks'

or

Pthread::Pthread.add_executors 5, 'tasks'

Methods #add_executor and #add_executors take an optional parameter that specifies a queue name.

In order to connect an executor from a separate machine in your programm you can call:

Pthread::PthreadExecutor.new '192.168.1.100:12345', 'tasks'

specifing the host and a desired queue.

Now you can spawn Pthreads in order to gain multicore performance by providing name of the queue, code to be executed and context variables:

pthread = Pthread::Pthread.new queue: 'tasks', code: %{
  x ** 2
}, context: { x: 5 }

When you need to get the value back simple call

pthread.value # => 25

If exception is raised inside a pthread in doesn't affect the whole process. Exception is raise by accesing pthread's value.

pthread.value # => raise exception

To stop executors on the server machine simply run

Pthread::Pthread.kill_executors

1. Fork it
2. Create your feature branch (git checkout -b my-new-feature)
3. Commit your changes (git commit -am 'Add some feature')
4. Push to the branch (git push origin my-new-feature)
5. Create new Pull Request