[Quickfix-developers] Integrate socket connections into application-wide async socket loop

[Sean L. <sea...@da...>]

Hi all,

I want to integrate QuickFix into my Python proxy software's socket  
event  loop - the purpose is to translate a proprietary protocol into  
FIX. My proxy runs a simple async loop using poll(2) on Linux as it  
happens, although that's not so important I don't think.

So to efficiently integrate a QuickFix event loop into my proxy,  
ideally I'd like a way to pull out the socket FDs and use them in my  
overall poll call. Then it's easy I figure - I can use  
SocketInitiator::poll to handle the socket event using the existing  
mechanisms. Although this isn't superclean, as the socket FD is a  
fairly ubiquitous token on a *nix box, it doesn't seem obscene to me  
to pull that out of the socket internals for use in a larger event  
loop as something to poll for events using kernel-level mechanisms.

 From the highly elegant use of patterns in QuickFix I'd hazard a  
guess that others here might accuse me of poor taste ;-)

The rub is: is there any reasonable way to do pull out the socket FD  
without modifying the C++ engine? I really like the simplicity of  
hooking in via the SWIG bindings, and I'd like to be able to use  
QuickFix unpatched if possible simply for ease of maintenance  
(although I'm competent enough in C++ to hack the source if necessary).

I guess in C++ I would subclass the strategy as that owns the FDs,  
and then use a replacement SocketInitiator that subclasses my  
customized strategy and Initiator. Would that be the right way to go?  
Could I actually do this all successfully in pure Python? If I can,  
then I'll still have to rewrite SocketInitiator in Python right?

Or is there a more elegant approach to my basic problem that I'm not  
seeing?

Thanks in advance for any insights,

Sean

(ObAppreciation: thanks to those responsible for QuickFix - it's a  
great joy to find a requirement met by such a competently written and  
packaged piece of free software)

-- 
Sean Legassick
se...@da...