[Vortex] [ANN] Vortex Library 1.1.2 'Sirena Varada' release is ready!

[Francis Brosnan Blazquez]

      ###################################################
      ##              Vortex Library 1.1.2             ##
      ##                "Sirena Varada!"               ##
      ###################################################

Release note
~~~~~~~~~~~~

  Advanced Software Production Line is proud to announce the Vortex
  Library 1.1.2 "Sirena varada" release availability: an open source
  "BEEP Core" protocol implementation written in C, mapped onto
  TCP/IP.

  Vortex Library is a stable and robust application protocol
  development toolkit, with active support for Microsoft Windows and
  GNU/Linux platforms.

  Check out the following links to get ready with Vortex Library:

    - http://www.aspl.es/vortex
      [Vortex Library homepage]

    - http://www.aspl.es/turbulence
      [Turbulence BEEP server homepage]
 
    - http://www.sf.net/projects/vortexlibrary
      [Sources and Win32 binaries]

    - http://www.beepcore.org
      [BEEP Core community web site]

    - http://www.aspl.es/xml
      [Axl Library, XML 1.0 implementation]
    
This release in short
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  * Added Python support for Vortex Library: PyVortex. This new
  component provides python bindings for Vortex 1.1 API. Now it is
  possible to write python applications (client and listeners) using
  Vortex engine. Nice! 

    http://www.aspl.es/vortex/py-vortex/html/

  * Added an unified SASL auth handler which will provide support, with
  the same handler, to perform authentication for all SASL profiles
  supported.

  * Updated vortex threading API to support user defined create and
  destroy handlers (thanks Wimpie). This was used to support the
  creation of BeepFP a Free Pascal BEEP implementation built on top of
  Vortex, written by Wimpie Nortje.

    http://wiki.lazarus.freepascal.org/BeepFp

  * Updated vortex internal implementation to support fork()
  operations, allowing to create independent processes to handle BEEP
  sessions, making possible to implement process isolation policies.

  Several bugs were fixed. Updated regression test to reproduce and
  check them. Several API documentation updates.   

Change notifications
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
  None

Thanks to..
~~~~~~~~~~~

  <Ralf Konusch> (Reported problems with vortex debug logging).

  <Wimpie Nortje> (Reported and fixed wrong user defined pointer
  handling at vortex_channel_pool_new_full and for providing patches
  that allows configuring create/destroy thread handlers. Also created
  BeepFp).

Changes since 1.1.1
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

* [fix] Fixed but at channel added handling causing to send frames
  issued on that handler first than the channel creation reply itself,
  making the remote BEEP peer to receive channel user space frames for
  a channel which is still in creation transit. Updated regression
  test to check is issued.

* [fix] Fixed missing compilation flags for test/ directory causing
  binaries to be built without TLS support (especially
  vortex-regression-*).

* [fix] Updated VortexOnStartChannelExtended, VortexTlsAcceptQuery,
  VortexTlsCertificateFileLocator and VortexTlsPrivateKeyFileLocator
  to make static parameters to have a const declaration. Parameters
  that now have const are:

   - serverName
   - profile
   - profile_content
  
  Applied required changes in the rest of files declaring handler of
  these types.

* [fix] Updated regression test to make it runnable by several users
  at the same time.

* [fix] Updated vortex profile tutorial to point to subversion files
  and to note that all code developed is found inside the test/
  directory as suggest Ralf (musifan1 at web.de).


* [new] Added new function to perform a safe queue unref operation
  which nullify the caller's queue reference in case of queue refcount
  is 0. API added:

   - vortex_async_queue_safe_unref

* [new] Added support to implement reference counting on VortexCtx
  type. Updated vortex_ctx_new and vortex_ctx_free to implement
  internally reference counting but providing the same function until
  now. Added a couple of functions to handle reference counting. API
  added:
  
   - vortex_ctx_ref
   - vortex_ctx_unref

* [fix] Fixed vortex_ctx_unref to properly check ctx reference after
  unref operation without accessing memory.

* [fix] Fixed vortex reader memory leak caused by connections
  registered that are closed before the reader receives it.

* [fix] Fixed documentation at the vortex listener module.

* [fix] Committing changes to prepare preview 1.1.2

* [fix] General change to produce a windows installer with a default
  release and an additional build with log support.

* [fix] Updated vortex_log_enable, vortex_log2_enable and
  vortex_color_log_enable to include comments that references to
  associated environment variables, etc. Thanks to (Ralf Konusch).
  
* [fix] Added -Wstrict-prototypes to compilation flags and fixed
  errors reported.

* [fix] Fixed vortex_log_enable and vortex_log2_enable to disable log
  after it was activated. Reported by Ralf Konusch.

* [fix] Making vortex_connection_new_from_empty to check the socket
  received before configuring it and to set a -1 to avoid closing std
  socket descriptors on failure.

* [fix] Updated vortex_connection_close implementation to also support
  closing broken listeners (not started due to permissions, bind
  problems, etc).

* [fix] Fixed vortex_connection_close race condition with vortex
  reader module in the case the close operations is done on a running
  listener. Added regression test to reproduce the problem and check
  the fix introduced.

* [fix] General changes to make windows compilation to produce non
  stripped dlls for debug builds.

* [fix] Updated vortex_mutex_lock and vortex_async_queue_lock
  documentation to explain Microsoft Windows limitations associated to
  locking/unlocking from different threads.

* [fix] Updated vortex-regression-client.c to properly run test_01c
  under windows.

* [fix] Removed SO_REUSEADDR socket option from vortex listener
  module, which was causing to not properly detect listener with
  already in use address.

* [fix] Fixed vortex_connection_get_role to always return the role
  configured without taking into consideration connection
  status. Added regression test to check the problem and fix
  introduced (test_01e).

* [fix] Restored SO_REUSEADDR inside vortex_listener module if used
  inside linux/unix platforms.

* [fix] Moved header definitions required by tls module from base
  library. Elements moved:

   - VortexTlsActivation
   - VortexTlsAcceptQuery
   - VortexTlsCertificateFileLocator
   - VortexTlsPrivateKeyFileLocator
   - VortexTlsCtxCreation
   - VortexTlsPostCheck
 
* [new] Updated libvortex-sasl-1.1 implementation to provide an unified
  auth handler that can be used to manage all SASL profiles supported
  by Vortex API. This will simplify SASL integration and will provide
  a more easy API evolution by not requiring to explicitly support a
  mechanism through the public API. Old API remains without being
  deprecated.  Updated regression test to check added functionality

   - vortex_sasl_accept_negotiation_common (function)
   - VortexSaslProps (type)
   - VortexSaslCommonHandler (handler)

* [fix] Reorganized internal libvortex-sasl-1.1 implementation
  to make the code more maintainable.

* [fix] Fixed bug inside vortex_channel_pool_new_full which was not
  provided user defined pointer to on_channel_pool_created handler
  (reported by Wimpie Nortje).
  
* [fix] Updated vortex_connection_close documentation.

* [fix] Adding python vortex directory..

* [fix] Committing first initial structure to implement the binding.
  More work is required to understand the binding structure...

* [new] Added initial structure to implement regression tests that
  will be used to validate the product.

* [fix] Changed building system to use autotools rather distutils.

* [new] Added initial support for vortex.Ctx and vortex.Connection
  types.  Added regression tests which properly run vortex
  initialization, vortex connection and a vortex close operation.

* [new] Added two new regression tests to check connection.shutdown
  and channel open and close operations. Added initial implementation
  to support vortex.Channel object. API added:
  
   - conn.open_channel
   - channel.close
   - channel.profile
   - channel.number
   - conn.shutdown
   - conn.num_channels

* [fix] Added initial implementation for vortex.AsyncQueue type. Added
  initial regression test. Still more work required. Seems
  vortex.AsyncQueue requires GC cyclic support....

* [fix] Fixed vortex.AsyncQueue API and GC problems. Added regression
  test which fully check the type with large add operations.

* [new] Added initial support to wrap VortexFrame object, now
  available through vortex.Frame type. Added support to get main
  fields: content, payload, sizes, frame type, msgno, ansno
  and. seqno, more_flag.

* [new] Added new regression test with an initial working example
  sending and receiving frames using vortex thread notification. Still
  has some problems to be solved.

* [new] Updated py_vortex_connection API to allow creating
  PyVortexConnection objects using already created VortexConnection
  instances. Updated PyVortexConnection initialization to check if
  constructor received parameter or an empty initialization. API
  added:

  - py_vortex_connection_create

* [fix] Added initial support to activate threading API allowing to
  use native vortex invocation method. Just an initial experiment
  before starting to use pull API.

* [fix] Making py_vortex_async_queue_pop/timedpop to use
  PyGILState_Ensure after returning to ensure the caller gets the data
  and the appropriate running context.

* [fix] Updated py_vortex_channel module to include two new python
  methods:

   - send_msg
   - set_frame_received

* [fix] Fixed segmentation fault just after frame received handler
  notifies python code (using a newly created thread not registered by
  python). Used PEP 311 to lock and acquire the GIL before getting
  inside python space. Nice!

* [fix] Committing fully fixed working version that does a simple
  request/response test and a consistent way (memory access and memory
  usage). Nice.

* [new] Added support to configure channel serialize and added
  regression test to check its function. API added:

  - channel.set_serialize (boolean)

* [fix] Fixed frame.content and frame.payload to also consider content
  and payload size to build the string returned to the python
  environment.  Added regression test to check binary strings with \0
  included to be transferred and replied.

* [fix] Added regression test to check several channels created over
  the same connection.

* [fix] Added initial support to allow conn.open_channel to configure
  the frame_received and frame_recieved_data handler.

* [new] Added initial implementation of vortex-regression-listener.py

* [fix] Fixed several bugs and memory leaks at the AsyncQueue type.
  Updated regression tests to check it. Removed queue.unref () method
  since it is not required due to the nature of python.

* [new] Added support for conn.pop_channel_error () to enable
  application level to get channel creation errors. Updated regression
  test.

* [new] Added support for vortex.queue_replay and channel.get_reply to
  implement vortex get reply method. Updated regression test.

* [new] Added support to conn.open_channel to allow configuring the
  frame received handler and its associated data. Updated regression
  test.

* [fix] Fixed support for channel deny request. Updated regression
  test.

* [new] Added support for an internal logging which is activated via
  environment variables (PY_VORTEX_DEBUG and PY_VORTEX_DEBUG_COLOR).

* [fix] Updated vortex.Connection module to close the connection in
  the case the reference is collected. Making the module to acquire a
  reference to vortex.Ctx to ensure it is not finished the ctx before
  conn.

* [new] Added initial implementation to create a listener:
  vortex.create_listener.

* [fix] Added PY_VORTEX_CONNECTION_CHECK_NOT_ROLE macro to check
  services that are only available to a particular connection
  role. Still requires some additional checking.

* [fix] Removed is_listener parameter from
  py_vortex_connection_create. The function can use VortexConnection
  role to get this data.

* [fix] Changed py_vortex_ctx_get to require a PyObject rather than
  PyVortexCtx.

* [fix] Added initial test to check BEEP listener support. Added API
  call vortex.create_listener

* [new] Added conn.role which returns an string representing the role.

* [fix] Added debug comments to py-vortex-connection and py-vortex
  modules.

* [fix] Finally solved vortex.create_listener bug (what
  nightmare!). The problem was caused by an exception triggered by the
  PyVortexConnection constructor which was later handle only until a
  python frame change (like calling a new function). Making
  PyVortexConnection constructor to truly allow empty creation.

* [fix] Fixed regression test to remove all occurrences of ;. Added
  some debug comments inside several files.

* [fix] More updates to check listener function..

* [new] Added initial implementation vortex.profile_register. Still
  more work required to really test its function.

* [new] Added initial implementation to handle exceptions produced
  inside the python execution domain.

* [new] Added initial implementation for vortex.wait_listeners which
  is a direct wrapper for vortex_listener_wait. However it is not
  signal friendly so more work is required.

* [new] Added initial working implementation for server side frame
  received.

* [fix] More updates to vortex-regression-listener.py to make it
  functional to run all regression tests..

* [fix] Fixed problem with vortex.wait_listeners to signal handling
  which was causing to never stop python interpreter after receiving
  sigterm/int/quit.

* [fix] Fixed vortex.Connection deallocation to properly collect
  master listener connections.

* [fix] Fixed bug inside py_vortex_channel_create (was not acquiring a
  reference).

* [new] Added support for channel.send_rpy and channel.send_err. Now
  we have a fully working client/listener python implementation that
  runs first 5 reg tests. NICE!

* [fix] Added exception handling to second level frame received
  handling.

* [fix] Making channel.{send_msg|send_rpy|send_err} to accept empty
  strings (none values) as native C API allows to receive NULL values.

* [new] Added support for server side channel start notification.  Now
  all regression tests are supported with
  vortex-regression-listener.py

* [new] Added support for connection on close notification. API added:

   - conn.set_on_close

* [fix] Added regression test to check support for connection on close
  notification.

* [new] Added support to control vortex console log. API added:

   - ctx.log (boolean)
   - ctx.log2 (boolean)
   - ctx.color_log (boolean)

* [fix] Fixed vortex.create_listener to avoid creating several
  listeners to and to properly report error on listener creation
  failure. Added regression test_13.

* [fix] Fixed conn.close to properly support closing listener
  connections (either running or those that failed to start). Check
  implementation to release all memory after termination. Updated
  regression test.

* [new] General update to include support for SASL and TLS profiles
  through vortex.sasl and vortex.tls packages. Updated binding
  structure to be installable into python sites package or other OS
  destination, by following python rules.
  
  vortex.sasl API added:
 
   - init
   - is_authenticated
   - start_auth
   - method_used
   - auth_id
   - accept_mech

  vortex.tls API added:
 
   - init
   - start_tls
   - accept_tls

* [fix] Updated py_vortex_handle_and_clear_exception to be usable from
  other bindings to handle and implement exception reporiting. Added
  support to configure an external handler to receive exceptions
  found. API added:

  - py_vortex_set_exception_handler
  - PyVortexExceptionHandler

* [fix] Updted vortex.Frame class to also support attributes: msg_no,
  seq_no and ans_no (as well as msgno, seqno and asno).

* [fix] Updated vortex.Connection class to include a instance method
  find_by_uri to return all vortex.Channel found running a particular
  profile.

* [fix] Updated vortex.Channel module to include support to check
  channel ready status and missing API to send ANS frames. API added:

    - is_ready (property)
    - send_ans
    - finalize_ans

* [fix] Making on_close_data parameter to be optional for set_on_close
  method.

* [fix] Removing queue.ref method (AsyncQueue) not needed inside the
  context of python.

* [new] Updated vortex thread handling API to allow configuring an
  external thread creator/destructor functions making possible
  external components to control thread startup and termination.  Bug
  reported and patch to update the API provided by Wimpie Nortj
  (thanks a lot!). API added:

  - VortexThreadCreateFunc (handler)
  - VortexThreadDestroyFunc (handler)
  - vortex_thread_set_create 
  - vortex_thread_set_destroy

* [fix] General update to make vortex_init_ctx to be callable twice
  reinitializing all mutex found but keeping the rest of structures
  (required to complete a proper status recovering after forking
  processes running initialized vortex).

* [new] Updated vortex ctx API to allow registering a handler which is
  called in the case the vortex reader process detects no more
  connections were available to be watched (after having registered
  some connections that were closed). API added:

    - VortexOnFinishHandler (handler)
    - vortex_ctx_set_on_finish

* [fix] Updated vortex_support_add_domain_search_path_ref to check
  domain/path pair added to avoid duplicating content.

* [fix] Making vortex listener accept code to check connection status
  after calling user space to avoid sending a message. Also updated
  code to call to vortex_listener_complete_register.
  
* [fix] Updated web page to include BeepFp reference. Nice product.

* [new] Updated vortex connection API to include two new functions
  that returns local address and local port used. API added:

  - vortex_connection_get_local_addr
  - vortex_connection_get_local_port

* [fix] Fixed problem with test_01c which was causing, under some
  machines to not properly execute. Rewritten test to fix the issue.

* [new] Updated PyVortexConnection class to incluede two new read only
  attributes that returns local_addr and local port used. API added:

  - vortex.Connection.local_addr
  - vortex.Connection.local_port

* [fix] Fixed a race condition while manipulating profile list
  activated by channel start operation.

* [fix] Making connection aceptance at listener side to drop the
  connection if CONNECTION_STAGE_POST_CREATED event signals a failure.

* [fix] Updated documentation to explain the relation between
  CONNECTION_STAGE_POST_CREATED event with handlers configured at
  vortex_listener_set_on_connection_accepted.

* [fix] Splitted vortex_listener_accept_connections into a couple of
  functions with a reusable public part. API added:

   - vortex_listener_accept

* [new] Added new function to allow checking if a particular VortexCtx
  is initialized. Used this new API to better check some Vortex API
  functions to properly react without giving estrange errors. Added
  regression test to check new function (test_01-f). API added:
   
   - vortex_init_check

About Us
~~~~~~~~

  Advanced Software Production Line provides GNU/Linux support and
  consulting services to help organization to introduce GNU/Linux
  inside its process.

  Contact us, using English or Spanish, to get commercial support
  and/or BEEP based development services.

  You can reach us:

       http://www.aspl.es - info at aspl.es

  We hope Vortex Library help you. Enjoy Vortex Library!  

--
Francis Brosnan Blázquez           - francis at aspl.es
Advanced Software Production Line  - http://www.aspl.es
28th Sep 2009, Madrid (Spain)