async-fuse

Helpers for "fusing" asynchronous computations.

A fused operation has a well-defined behavior once the operation has completed. For Fuse it means that an operation that has completed will block forever by returning Poll::Pending.

This is similar to the Fuse type provided in futures-rs, but provides more utility allowing it to interact with types which does not implement FusedFuture or FusedStream as is now the case with all Tokio types since 1.0.

We also use Fuse to represent optional values, just like Option. But Fuse provides implementations and functions which allow us to safely perform operations over the value when it's pinned. Exactly what's needed to drive a Stream (see next) or poll a Future that might or might not be set.

Features

• stream - Makes the Fuse implement the Stream trait if it contains a stream.

Simplifying tokio::select!

One of the main uses for Fuse is to simplify how we use tokio::select!. In this section we'll look at how we can improve an optional branch, where the future being polled might or might not be set.

let mut maybe_future = Some(async { 42u32 });
tokio::pin!(maybe_future);

tokio::select! {
    value = async { maybe_future.as_mut().as_pin_mut().unwrap().await }, if maybe_future.is_some() => {
        maybe_future.set(None);
        assert_eq!(value, 42);
    }
    /* other branches */
}

assert!(maybe_future.is_none());

The async block above is necessary because the future is polled eagerly regardless of the branch precondition. This would cause the unwrap to panic in case the future isn't set. We also need to explicitly set the pin to None after completion. Otherwise we might poll it later which might panic.

With Fuse we can rewrite the branch and remove the async block. It also unsets the future for us after completion.

use async_fuse::Fuse;

let mut maybe_future = Fuse::new(async { 42u32 });
tokio::pin!(maybe_future);

tokio::select! {
    value = &mut maybe_future, if !maybe_future.is_empty() => {
        assert_eq!(value, 42);
    }
    /* other branches */
}

assert!(maybe_future.is_empty());

Finally if we don't need the else branch to evalute we can skip the branch precondition entirely. Allowing us to further reduce the code.

use async_fuse::Fuse;

let mut maybe_future = Fuse::new(async { 42u32 });
tokio::pin!(maybe_future);

tokio::select! {
    value = &mut maybe_future => {
        assert_eq!(value, 42);
    }
    /* other branches */
}

assert!(maybe_future.is_empty());

Fusing on the stack

For the first example we'll be fusing the value on the stack using tokio::pin!. We'll also be updating the fuse as it completes with another sleep with a configurable delay. Mimicking the behavior of Interval.

This is available as the stack_ticker example:

cargo run --example stack_ticker

use async_fuse::Fuse;
use std::time::Duration;
use tokio::time;

let mut duration = Duration::from_millis(500);

let sleep = Fuse::new(time::sleep(duration));
tokio::pin!(sleep);

let update_duration = Fuse::new(time::sleep(Duration::from_secs(2)));
tokio::pin!(update_duration);

for _ in 0..10usize {
    tokio::select! {
        _ = &mut sleep => {
            println!("Tick");
            sleep.set(Fuse::new(time::sleep(duration)));
        }
        _ = &mut update_duration => {
            println!("Tick faster!");
            duration = Duration::from_millis(250);
        }
    }
}

Fusing on the heap

For some types it might be easier to fuse the value on the heap. To make this easier, we provide the Fuse::pin constructor which provides a fused value which is pinned on the heap.

As a result, it looks pretty similar to the above example.

This is available as the heap_ticker example:

cargo run --example heap_ticker

use async_fuse::Fuse;
use std::time::Duration;
use tokio::time;

let mut duration = Duration::from_millis(500);

let mut sleep = Fuse::pin(time::sleep(duration));
let mut update_duration = Fuse::pin(time::sleep(Duration::from_secs(2)));

for _ in 0..10usize {
    tokio::select! {
        _ = &mut sleep => {
            println!("Tick");
            sleep.set(Box::pin(time::sleep(duration)));
        }
        _ = &mut update_duration => {
            println!("Tick faster!");
            duration = Duration::from_millis(250);
        }
    }
}

Fusing trait objects

The following showcases how we can fuse a trait object. Trait objects are useful since they allow the fused value to change between distinct implementations. The price is that we perform dynamic dispatch which has a small cost.

Also note that because CoerceUnsized is not yet stable, we cannot use Fuse::pin for convenience and have to pass a pinned box through Fuse::new.

This is available as the trait_object_ticker example:

cargo run --example trait_object_ticker

use async_fuse::Fuse;
use std::future::Future;
use std::pin::Pin;
use std::time::Duration;
use tokio::time;

let mut duration = Duration::from_millis(500);

let mut sleep: Fuse<Pin<Box<dyn Future<Output = ()>>>> =
    Fuse::new(Box::pin(time::sleep(duration)));

let mut update_duration: Fuse<Pin<Box<dyn Future<Output = ()>>>> =
    Fuse::new(Box::pin(time::sleep(Duration::from_secs(2))));

for _ in 0..10usize {
    tokio::select! {
        _ = &mut sleep => {
            println!("Tick");
            sleep.set(Box::pin(time::sleep(duration)));
        }
        _ = &mut update_duration => {
            println!("Tick faster!");
            duration = Duration::from_millis(250);
        }
    }
}