Clojure - Playing with Records - Part Three

   
   
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This article series discuss more than 30 different programming languages. Please read overview before you read any of the details.

Playing with Records Related Articles.

Table of Content
Where to Discuss?

Local Group

Preface

Goal: A simple case example of concurrency using Clojure.

I have been wondering, if Clojure have concurency with actor model, using sender and receiver. After spending a days, I finally find what I need, and I share these code for you.

6: Concurrency with Channel using Go Macro

For starter, there is a good reading. But this won’t be enough, as I’ll show you later.

Reference Reading

Clojure Project File

We need to a more setup, so that all script in this artcile could be handled.

  :profiles {…
             :t14-async        {:main t14-async}
             :t15-loop         {:main t15-loop}
             :t16-recursion    {:main t16-recursion}
          }

Setting Up The Asynchronous Library

First, we need to setup the dependency.

(ns t14-async
  (:gen-class)
  (:use my-songs)
  (:require [clojure.core.async :as a]))

(def tag-chan (a/chan))

Simple Asynchrounous Case

Then we can send and receive using put! and take!.

(a/go
  (while true
    (a/take! tag-chan println))
)

(defn -main [& args]
  (doseq [song songs]
    (if (not (nil? (:tags song)))
      (doseq [tag (:tags song)]
        (a/put! tag-chan tag)
  ))))

With the result similar as below string:

$ lein with-profile t14-async run
60s
jazz
60s
rock
70s
rock
70s
pop

Sender and Receiver

We can, rewrite above code with actor pattern, using sender and receiver.

(ns t14-async
  (:gen-class)
  (:use my-songs)
  (:require [clojure.core.async :as async]))

(def tag-chan (async/chan))

(defn receiver []
  (while true
    (async/take! tag-chan println))
)

(async/go (receiver))

(defn sender []
  (doseq [song songs]
    (if (not (nil? (:tags song)))
      (doseq [tag (:tags song)]
        (async/put! tag-chan tag)
  ))))

(defn -main [& args] (sender))

With the result exactly the same as above.

Clojure: Concurrency with Channel using Go Macro

This is the basic of sender and receiver. Or in other term called producer and customer.

Simplified Scope

We can arrange the namespace so we have shorter code

(ns t15-loop
  (:gen-class)
  (:use my-songs)
  (:require [clojure.core.async
    :as async
    :refer [>! <! >!! <!! go chan close!]]))

(def tag-chan (chan))

Breaking The Loop

Real life concurrency, require a stop signal, so we can quit the loop. This is a little bit tricky with clojure.

(go (do
  (def tags (atom []))
  (loop [tag (<!! tag-chan)]
    (when (not (= tag 0))
      (swap! tags conj tag)
      (println @tags)
      (recur (<!! tag-chan))
    ))
  (println "save me")
  (println @tags)
))

(defn -main [& args]
  (do
    (doseq [song songs]
      (if (not (nil? (:tags song)))
        (doseq [tag (:tags song)]
          (>!! tag-chan tag)
        )))
    (>!! tag-chan 0)
  ))

With the result similar as below:

$ lein with-profile t15-loop run
[60s]
[60s jazz]
[60s jazz 60s]
[60s jazz 60s rock]
[60s jazz 60s rock 70s]
[60s jazz 60s rock 70s rock]
[60s jazz 60s rock 70s rock 70s]
[60s jazz 60s rock 70s rock 70s pop]
save me
[60s jazz 60s rock 70s rock 70s pop]

The code above rely on this part:

  (loop [tag (<!! tag-chan)]
    (when (not (= tag 0))
      (swap! tags conj tag)
      (println @tags)
      (recur (<!! tag-chan))
    ))

Laziness in Asynchronous

I have a problem with laziness.

It is not me that lazy. This issue is in context of lazy call in clojure.

What if we get rid of this unwanted (println @tags) code line?

(go (do
  (def tags (atom []))
  (loop [tag (<!! tag-chan)]
    (when (not (= tag 0))
      (swap! tags conj tag)
      (recur (<!! tag-chan))
    ))
  (println "save me")
  (println @tags)
))

The result is not what we have expected, as shown below:

$ lein with-profile t15-loop run
save me

The last (println @tags) won’t print at all! What am I supposed to do?

7: Concurrency with Future

Luckily we have other concurrency feature called future.

Mutable using Atom

We can utilize future instead of go macro.

(defn receiver [] (do
  (def tags (atom []))
  (loop [tag (<!! tag-chan)]
    (when (not (= tag 0))
      (swap! tags conj tag)
      (recur (<!! tag-chan))
    ))
  (println @tags)
  (close! tag-chan)
))

(defn sender []
  (do
    (doseq [song songs]
      (if (not (nil? (:tags song)))
        (doseq [tag (:tags song)]
          (>!! tag-chan tag))))
    (>!! tag-chan 0)))

(defn -main [& args]
  (future (receiver))
  (sender)
  (shutdown-agents)

The result is as good as what we expected, as shown below:

$ lein with-profile t15-loop run
[60s jazz 60s rock 70s rock 70s pop]

Clojure: Mutable in Concurrency with Future using Atom

Immutable Using Recursion

Immutability is very common in functinal programming. As an alternate approach, we can use recursive instead of using atom.

(defn receiver
  ([] (receiver []))
  ([tags]
    (let [tag (<!! tag-chan)]
      (if (not= tag 0)
        (receiver (conj tags tag))
        (println tags))
    )))

Clojure: Immutable in Concurrency with Future using Recursion: Receiver

With the result exactly the same as above.

$ lein with-profile t16-recursion run
[60s jazz 60s rock 70s rock 70s pop]

Clojure: Immutable in Concurrency with Future using Recursion: Sender

Which one is better, is depend on the use case.

What is Next 🤔?

We should be ready for our next topic, concurrency case example.

Consider continue reading [ Scala - Playing with Records - Part One ].