I'm currently working on a a project and I have a need to queue some jobs for processing, here's the requirement:
- Jobs must be processed one at a time
- A queued item must be able to be waited on
So I want something akin to:
Task<result> QueueJob(params here)
{
/// Queue the job and somehow return a waitable task that will wait until the queued job has been executed and return the result.
}
I've tried having a background running task that just pulls items off a queue and processes the job, but the difficulty is getting from a background task to the method.
If need be I could go the route of just requesting a completion callback in the QueueJob method, but it'd be great if I could get a transparent Task back that allows you to wait on the job to be processed (even if there are jobs before it in the queue).
Func<T>
takes no parameters and returns a value of type T. The jobs are run one by one and you can wait on the returned task to get the result.
public class TaskQueue
{
private Queue<Task> InnerTaskQueue;
private bool IsJobRunning;
public void Start()
{
Task.Factory.StartNew(() =>
{
while (true)
{
if (InnerTaskQueue.Count > 0 && !IsJobRunning)
{
var task = InnerTaskQueue.Dequeue()
task.Start();
IsJobRunning = true;
task.ContinueWith(t => IsJobRunning = false);
}
else
{
Thread.Sleep(1000);
}
}
}
}
public Task<T> QueueJob(Func<T> job)
{
var task = new Task<T>(() => job());
InnerTaskQueue.Enqueue(task);
return task;
}
}
You might find TaskCompletionSource<T>
useful, it can be used to create a Task
that completes exactly when you want it to. If you combine it with BlockingCollection<T>
, you will get your queue:
class JobProcessor<TInput, TOutput> : IDisposable
{
private readonly Func<TInput, TOutput> m_transform;
// or a custom type instead of Tuple
private readonly
BlockingCollection<Tuple<TInput, TaskCompletionSource<TOutput>>>
m_queue =
new BlockingCollection<Tuple<TInput, TaskCompletionSource<TOutput>>>();
public JobProcessor(Func<TInput, TOutput> transform)
{
m_transform = transform;
Task.Factory.StartNew(ProcessQueue, TaskCreationOptions.LongRunning);
}
private void ProcessQueue()
{
Tuple<TInput, TaskCompletionSource<TOutput>> tuple;
while (m_queue.TryTake(out tuple, Timeout.Infinite))
{
var input = tuple.Item1;
var tcs = tuple.Item2;
try
{
tcs.SetResult(m_transform(input));
}
catch (Exception ex)
{
tcs.SetException(ex);
}
}
}
public Task<TOutput> QueueJob(TInput input)
{
var tcs = new TaskCompletionSource<TOutput>();
m_queue.Add(Tuple.Create(input, tcs));
return tcs.Task;
}
public void Dispose()
{
m_queue.CompleteAdding();
}
}
I would go for something like this:
class TaskProcessor<TResult>
{
// TODO: Error handling!
readonly BlockingCollection<Task<TResult>> blockingCollection = new BlockingCollection<Task<TResult>>(new ConcurrentQueue<Task<TResult>>());
public Task<TResult> AddTask(Func<TResult> work)
{
var task = new Task<TResult>(work);
blockingCollection.Add(task);
return task; // give the task back to the caller so they can wait on it
}
public void CompleteAddingTasks()
{
blockingCollection.CompleteAdding();
}
public TaskProcessor()
{
ProcessQueue();
}
void ProcessQueue()
{
Task<TResult> task;
while (blockingCollection.TryTake(out task))
{
task.Start();
task.Wait(); // ensure this task finishes before we start a new one...
}
}
}
Depending on the type of app that is using it, you could switch out the BlockingCollection/ConcurrentQueue for something simpler (eg just a plain queue). You can also adjust the signature of the "AddTask" method depending on what sort of methods/parameters you will be queueing up...