Glossary

call dispatcher

HarpCaller daemon, harpcallerd(8), acting as a proxy between clients and daemons (harpd(8)). Dispatcher stores call results and can provide them at later time.

daemon

harpd(8), which receives RPC calls, executes appropriate function, and responds with its result. Code of functions that can be called is part of the daemon’s configuration.

client library

Python harp module that communicates with HarpCaller and harpd(8) daemons.

queue

List of jobs to carry out. At most N jobs are running at a single time, with N being queue’s concurrency level, newer jobs waiting for some already running job to terminate.

concurrency level

Maximum number of jobs that can run simultaneously in a given queue.

RPC call

A request sent to a harpd(8) instance. The request carries name of the procedure to be called and arguments to the procedure.

job

call job

HarpCaller’s record about RPC call.

identifier

UUID (string representation) that is used to tell the jobs apart.

end result

Value that was returned by called function. Receiving the end result marks the termination of RPC call (and, in turn, the call job). End result may be preceded by stream result.

stream result

partial results

Sequence of values returned by called function. None of these values denote termination of RPC call. Partial results are passed to client immediately after being produced, without waiting for the function to terminate.

error

Operational problem, like network or disk error, unknown job, or unknown host.

exception

An exception raised by the function executed for RPC call. An exception usually means that there is some problem with function’s code.