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Vert.x Core Manual


In the beginning there was Vert.x
Specifying options when creating a Vertx object
Creating a clustered Vert.x object
Are you fluent?
Dont call us, well call you.
Dont block me!
Reactor and Multi-Reactor
The Golden Rule - Dont Block the Event Loop
Running blocking code
Verticles
Writing Verticles
Accessing the vertx instance from a verticle
Asynchronous Verticle start and stop
Verticle Types
Standard verticles
Worker verticles
Deploying verticles programmatically
Rules for mapping a verticle name to a verticle factory
How are Verticle Factories located?
Waiting for deployment to complete
Undeploying verticle deployments
Specifying number of verticle instances
Passing configuration to a verticle
Accessing environment variables in a Verticle
Verticle Isolation Groups
High Availability
Running Verticles from the command line
Causing Vert.x to exit
The Context object
Executing periodic and delayed actions
The Event Bus
The Theory
The Event Bus API
Automatic clean-up in verticles
JSON
JSON objects
JSON arrays
Buffers
Creating buffers
Writing to a Buffer
Reading from a Buffer
Buffer length
Copying buffers
Slicing buffers
Buffer re-use
Writing TCP servers and clients
Creating a TCP server
Configuring a TCP server
Start the Server Listening
Listening on a random port
Getting notified of incoming connections
Reading data from the socket
Writing data to a socket
Closed handler
http://vertx.io/docs/vertx-core/groovy/

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Handling exceptions
Event bus write handler
Local and remote addresses
Sending files
Streaming sockets
Upgrading connections to SSL/TLS
Closing a TCP Server
Automatic clean-up in verticles
Scaling - sharing TCP servers
Creating a TCP client
Configuring a TCP client
Making connections
Configuring connection attempts
Configuring servers and clients to work with SSL/TLS
Writing HTTP servers and clients
Creating an HTTP Server
Configuring an HTTP server
Start the Server Listening
Getting notified of incoming requests
Handling requests
Sending back responses
HTTP Compression
Creating an HTTP client
Making requests
Handling http responses
Enabling compression on the client
Pooling and keep alive
Pipe-lining
Server sharing
Using HTTPS with Vert.x
WebSockets
Automatic clean-up in verticles
Using Shared Data with Vert.x
Local shared maps
Cluster-wide asynchronous maps
Cluster-wide locks
Cluster-wide counters
Using the file system with Vert.x
Asynchronous files
Datagram sockets (UDP)
Creating a DatagramSocket
Sending Datagram packets
Receiving Datagram packets
Multicast
DNS client
lookup
lookup4
lookup6
resolveA
resolveAAAA
resolveCNAME
resolveMX
resolveTXT
resolveNS
resolveSRV
resolvePTR
reverseLookup
Error handling
Streams
ReadStream
WriteStream
Pump
Record Parser
Thread safety
Metrics SPI
OSGi
The 'vertx' command line
Run verticles
Executing verticles packaged as a fat jar
Displaying version of Vert.x
Cluster Managers
Logging
http://vertx.io/docs/vertx-core/groovy/

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Configuring JUL logging


Using another logging framework
Logging from your application
High Availability and Fail-Over
Automatic failover
HA groups
Dealing with network partitions - Quora
Security notes
Web applications
Clustered event bus traffic
Standard security best practices

Table of Contents
In the beginning there was Vert.x
Specifying options when creating a Vertx object
Creating a clustered Vert.x object
Are you fluent?
Dont call us, well call you.
Dont block me!
Reactor and Multi-Reactor
The Golden Rule - Dont Block the Event Loop
Running blocking code
Verticles
Writing Verticles
Accessing the vertx instance from a verticle
Asynchronous Verticle start and stop
Verticle Types
Standard verticles
Worker verticles
Deploying verticles programmatically
Rules for mapping a verticle name to a verticle factory
How are Verticle Factories located?
Waiting for deployment to complete
Undeploying verticle deployments
Specifying number of verticle instances
Passing configuration to a verticle
Accessing environment variables in a Verticle
Verticle Isolation Groups
High Availability
Running Verticles from the command line
Causing Vert.x to exit
The Context object
Executing periodic and delayed actions
The Event Bus
The Theory
The Event Bus API
Automatic clean-up in verticles
JSON
JSON objects
JSON arrays
Buffers
Creating buffers
Writing to a Buffer
Reading from a Buffer
Buffer length
Copying buffers
Slicing buffers
Buffer re-use
Writing TCP servers and clients
Creating a TCP server
Configuring a TCP server
Start the Server Listening
Listening on a random port
Getting notified of incoming connections
Reading data from the socket
Writing data to a socket
Closed handler
Handling exceptions
Event bus write handler
Local and remote addresses
http://vertx.io/docs/vertx-core/groovy/

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Sending files
Streaming sockets
Upgrading connections to SSL/TLS
Closing a TCP Server
Automatic clean-up in verticles
Scaling - sharing TCP servers
Creating a TCP client
Configuring a TCP client
Making connections
Configuring connection attempts
Configuring servers and clients to work with SSL/TLS
Writing HTTP servers and clients
Creating an HTTP Server
Configuring an HTTP server
Start the Server Listening
Getting notified of incoming requests
Handling requests
Sending back responses
HTTP Compression
Creating an HTTP client
Making requests
Handling http responses
Enabling compression on the client
Pooling and keep alive
Pipe-lining
Server sharing
Using HTTPS with Vert.x
WebSockets
Automatic clean-up in verticles
Using Shared Data with Vert.x
Local shared maps
Cluster-wide asynchronous maps
Cluster-wide locks
Cluster-wide counters
Using the file system with Vert.x
Asynchronous files
Datagram sockets (UDP)
Creating a DatagramSocket
Sending Datagram packets
Receiving Datagram packets
Multicast
DNS client
lookup
lookup4
lookup6
resolveA
resolveAAAA
resolveCNAME
resolveMX
resolveTXT
resolveNS
resolveSRV
resolvePTR
reverseLookup
Error handling
Streams
ReadStream
WriteStream
Pump
Record Parser
Thread safety
Metrics SPI
OSGi
The 'vertx' command line
Run verticles
Executing verticles packaged as a fat jar
Displaying version of Vert.x
Cluster Managers
Logging
Configuring JUL logging
Using another logging framework
Logging from your application
http://vertx.io/docs/vertx-core/groovy/

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High Availability and Fail-Over


Automatic failover
HA groups
Dealing with network partitions - Quora
Security notes
Web applications
Clustered event bus traffic
Standard security best practices
At the heart of Vert.x is a set of Java APIs that we call Vert.x Core
Repository.
Vert.x core provides functionality for things like:
Writing TCP clients and servers
Writing HTTP clients and servers including support for WebSockets
The Event bus
Shared data - local maps and clustered distributed maps
Periodic and delayed actions
Deploying and undeploying Verticles
Datagram Sockets
DNS client
File system access
High availability
Clustering
The functionality in core is fairly low level - you wont find stuff like database access, authorisation or high level web functionality here
- that kind of stuff youll find in Vert.x ext (extensions).
Vert.x core is small and lightweight. You just use the parts you want. Its also entirely embeddable in your existing applications - we
dont force you to structure your applications in a special way just so you can use Vert.x.
You can use core from any of the other languages that Vert.x supports. But herea a cool bit - we dont force you to use the Java API
directly from, say, JavaScript or Ruby - after all, different languages have different conventions and idioms, and it would be odd to
force Java idioms on Ruby developers (for example). Instead, we automatically generate an idiomatic equivalent of the core Java APIs
for each language.
From now on well just use the word core to refer to Vert.x core.
Lets discuss the different concepts and features in core.

In the beginning there was Vert.x


Note Much of this is Java specific - need someway of swapping in language specific parts
You cant do much in Vert.x-land unless you can commune with a Vertxobject!
Its the control centre of Vert.x and is how you do pretty much everything, including creating clients and servers, getting a reference to
the event bus, setting timers, as well as many other things.
So how do you get an instance?
If youre embedding Vert.x then you simply create an instance as follows:
import io.vertx.groovy.core.Vertx
def vertx = Vertx.vertx()

If youre using Verticles


Note

Most applications will only need a single Vert.x instance, but its possible to create multiple Vert.x instances if you require, for
example, isolation between the event bus or different groups of servers and clients.

http://vertx.io/docs/vertx-core/groovy/

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Specifying options when creating a Vertx object


When creating a Vertx object you can also specify options if the defaults arent right for you:
import io.vertx.groovy.core.Vertx
def vertx = Vertx.vertx([
workerPoolSize:40
])

The VertxOptionsobject has many settings and allows you to configure things like clustering, high availability, pool sizes and various
other settings. The Javadoc describes all the settings in detail.

Creating a clustered Vert.x object


If youre creating a clustered Vert.x (See the section on the event bus for more information on clustering the event bus), then you will
normally use the asynchronous variant to create the Vertx object.
This is because it usually takes some time (maybe a few seconds) for the different Vert.x instances in a cluster to group together. During
that time, we dont want to block the calling thread, so we give the result to you asynchronously.

Are you fluent?


You may have noticed that in the previous examples a fluent API was used.
A fluent API is where multiple methods calls can be chained together. For example:
request.response().putHeader("Content-Type", "text/plain").write("some text").end()

This is a common pattern throughout Vert.x APIs, so get used to it.


Chaining calls like this allows you to write code thats a little bit less verbose. Of course, if you dont like the fluent approach we dont
force you to do it that way, you can happily ignore it if you prefer and write your code like this:
def response = request.response()
response.putHeader("Content-Type", "text/plain")
response.write("some text")
response.end()

Dont call us, well call you.


The Vert.x APIs are largely event driven. This means that when things happen in Vert.x that you are interested in, Vert.x will call you
by sending you events.
Some example events are:
a timer has fired
some data has arrived on a socket,
some data has been read from disk
an exception has occurred
an HTTP server has received a request
You handle events by providing handlers to the Vert.x APIs. For example to receive a timer event every second you would do:
vertx.setPeriodic(1000, { id ->
// This handler will get called every second
println("timer fired!")
})

Or to receive an HTTP request:


// Respond to each http request with "Hello World"
server.requestHandler({ request ->
// This handler will be called every time an HTTP request is received at the server
request.response().end("hello world!")
})

Some time later when Vert.x has an event to pass to your handler Vert.x will call it asynchronously.
This leads us to some important concepts in Vert.x:

http://vertx.io/docs/vertx-core/groovy/

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Dont block me!


With very few exceptions (i.e. some file system operations ending in 'Sync'), none of the APIs in Vert.x block the calling thread.
If a result can be provided immediately, it will be returned immediately, otherwise you will usually provide a handler to receive events
some time later.
Because none of the Vert.x APIs block threads that means you can use Vert.x to handle a lot of concurrency using just a small number
of threads.
With a conventional blocking API the calling thread might block when:
Reading data from a socket
Writing data to disk
Sending a message to a recipient and waiting for a reply.
Many other situations
In all the above cases, when your thread is waiting for a result it cant do anything else - its effectively useless.
This means that if you want a lot of concurrency using blocking APIs then you need a lot of threads to prevent your application grinding
to a halt.
Threads have overhead in terms of the memory they require (e.g. for their stack) and in context switching.
For the levels of concurrency required in many modern applications, a blocking approach just doesnt scale.

Reactor and Multi-Reactor


We mentioned before that Vert.x APIs are event driven - Vert.x passes events to handlers when they are available.
In most cases Vert.x calls your handlers using a thread called an event loop.
As nothing in Vert.x or your application blocks, the event loop can merrily run around delivering events to different handlers in
succession as they arrive.
Because nothing blocks, an event loop can potentially deliver huge amounts of events in a short amount of time. For example a single
event loop can handle many thousands of HTTP requests very quickly.
We call this the Reactor Pattern.
You may have heard of this before - for example Node.js implements this pattern.
In a standard reactor implementation there is a single event loop thread which runs around in a loop delivering all events to all handlers
as they arrive.
The trouble with a single thread is it can only run on a single core at any one time, so if you want your single threaded reactor
application (e.g. your Node.js application) to scale over your multi-core server you have to start up and manage many different
processes.
Vert.x works differently here. Instead of a single event loop, each Vertx instance maintains several event loops. By default we choose
the number based on the number of available cores on the machine, but this can be overridden.
This means a single Vertx process can scale across your server, unlike Node.js.
We call this pattern the Multi-Reactor Pattern to distinguish it from the single threaded reactor pattern.
Note

Even though a Vertx instance maintains multiple event loops, any particular handler will never be executed concurrently, and in
most cases (with the exception of worker verticles) will always be called using the exact same event loop.

The Golden Rule - Dont Block the Event Loop


We already know that the Vert.x APIs are non blocking and wont block the event loop, but thats not much help if you block the event
loop yourself in a handler.
If you do that, then that event loop will not be able to do anything else while its blocked. If you block all of the event loops in Vertx
instance then your application will grind to a complete halt!
So dont do it! You have been warned.
http://vertx.io/docs/vertx-core/groovy/

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Examples of blocking include:


Thread.sleep()
Waiting on a lock
Waiting on a mutex or monitor (e.g. synchronized section)
Doing a long lived database operation and waiting for a result
Doing a complex calculation that takes some significant time.
Spinning in a loop
If any of the above stop the event loop from doing anything else for a significant amount of time then you should go immediately to
the naughty step, and await further instructions.
So what is a significant amount of time?
How long is a piece of string? It really depends on your application and the amount of concurrency you require.
If you have a single event loop, and you want to handle 10000 http requests per second, then its clear that each request cant take more
than 0.1 ms to process, so you cant block for any more time than that.
The maths is not hard and shall be left as an exercise for the reader.
If your application is not responsive it might be a sign that you are blocking an event loop somewhere. To help you diagnose such
issues, Vert.x will automatically log warnings if it detects an event loop hasnt returned for some time. If you see warnings like these in
your logs, then you should investigate.
Thread vertx-eventloop-thread-3 has been blocked for 20458 ms

Vert.x will also provide stack traces to pinpoint exactly where the blocking is occurring.
If you want to turn of these warnings or change the settings, you can do that in the VertxOptionsobject before creating the Vertx
object.

Running blocking code


In a perfect world, there will be no war or hunger, all APIs will be written asynchronously and bunny rabbits will skip hand-in-hand
with baby lambs across sunny green meadows.
But.. the real world is not like that. (Have you watched the news lately?)
Fact is, many, if not most libraries, especially in the JVM ecosystem have synchronous APIs and many of the methods are likely to
block. A good example is the JDBC API - its inherently synchronous, and no matter how hard it tries, Vert.x cannot sprinkle magic
pixie dust on it to make it asynchronous.
Were not going to rewrite everything to be asynchronous overnight so we need to provide you a way to use "traditional" blocking APIs
safely within a Vert.x application.
As discussed before, you cant call blocking operations directly from an event loop, as that would prevent it from doing any other useful
work. So how can you do this?
Its done by calling executeBlockingspecifying both the blocking code to execute and a result handler to be called back asynchronous
when the blocking code has been executed.
import groovy.transform.Field
@Field def someAPI = new examples.CoreExamples.BlockingAPI()
vertx.executeBlocking({ future ->
// Call some blocking API that takes a significant amount of time to return
def result = someAPI.blockingMethod("hello")
future.complete(result)
}, { res ->
println("The result is: ${res.result()}")
})

By default, if executeBlocking is called several times from the same context (e.g. the same verticle instance) then the different
executeBlocking are executed serially (i.e. one after another).
If you dont care about ordering you can call executeBlockingspecifying falseas the argument to ordered. In this case any
executeBlocking may be executed in parallel on the worker pool.
An alternative way to run blocking code is to use a worker verticle
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A worker verticle is always executed with a thread from the worker pool.

Verticles
Vert.x comes with a simple, scalable, actor-like deployment and concurrency model out of the box that you can use to save you writing
your own.
This model is entirely optional and Vert.x does not force you to create your applications in this way if you dont want to..
The model does not claim to be a strict actor-model implementation, but it does share similarities especially with respect to
concurrency, scaling and deployment.
To use this model, you write your code as set of verticles.
Verticles are chunks of code that get deployed and run by Vert.x. Verticles can be written in any of the languages that Vert.x supports
and a single application can include verticles written in multiple languages.
You can think of a verticle as a bit like an actor in the Actor Model.
An application would typically be composed of many verticle instances running in the same Vert.x instance at the same time. The
different verticle instances communicate with each other by sending messages on the event bus.

Writing Verticles
There are three alternatives to create verticles in Groovy:
a plain Groovy script
a Groovy class extending the GroovyVerticleclass
a Groovy class implementing the Verticleinterface or extending the AbstractVerticleclass
We will not cover the third case in this manual, as it is a plain Java class and instead you should read the
Vert.x manual for Java.

For example, the next snippet is a valid Groovy verticle:


println "Hello from vertx"

On deployment, by default, Vert.x executes the script. Optionally, your script can provide the startVertxand stopVertxmethods.
Theses methods are called respectively when the verticle starts and stops:
void vertxStart() {
println "starting"
}
void vertxStop() {
println "stopping"
}

Alternatively, you can extend the GroovyVerticleclass and implement the startand stopmethods:
import io.vertx.lang.groovy.GroovyVerticle;
public class HelloWorldHttpVerticle extends GroovyVerticle {
public void start() {
println("Starting")
}
public void stop() {
println("Stopping")
}
}

As in Java, vert.x creates a new instance of the class automatically. When Vert.x deploys the verticle it will call the startmethod, and
when the method has completed the verticle will be considered started.
You can also optionally override the stopmethod. This will be called by Vert.x when the verticle is undeployed and when the method
has completed the verticle will be considered stopped.

Accessing the vertx instance from a verticle


Regardless the way you use to implement your verticle, you access the vert.x instance using the vertxvariable / field.
Access to the vert.x instance in a Groovy script
http://vertx.io/docs/vertx-core/groovy/

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vertx.deployVerticle("another_verticle.rb")

Access to the vert.x instance in a Groovy class


import io.vertx.lang.groovy.GroovyVerticle;
public class HelloWorldHttpVerticle extends GroovyVerticle {
public void start() {
vertx.deployVerticle("another_verticle.js")
}
}

Asynchronous Verticle start and stop


Sometimes you want to do something in your verticle start-up which takes some time and you dont want the verticle to be considered
deployed until that happens. For example you might want to deploy other verticles in the start method.
You cant block waiting for the other verticles to deploy in your start method as that would break the Golden Rule.
So how can you do this?
The way to do it is to implement the asynchronous start method. This version of the method takes a Future as a parameter.When the
method returns the verticle will not be considered deployed.
Some time later, after youve done everything you need to do (e.g. start other verticles), you can call complete on the Future (or fail) to
signal that youre done. Similarly, there is an asynchronous version of the stop method too. You use this if you want to do some verticle
cleanup that takes some time.
When your verticle is implemented as a script, asynchronous start and stop are implemented as follows:
import io.vertx.groovy.core.Future
void vertxStart(Future<Void> future) {
println "starting"
vertx.deployVerticle("v.rb", { res ->
if (res.succeeded()) {
future.complete()
} else {
future.fail()
}
})
}
void vertxStop(Future<Void> future) {
println "stopping"
future.complete()
}

If your verticle extends GroovyVerticle, you override the startand stopmethods:


import io.vertx.core.Future
import io.vertx.lang.groovy.GroovyVerticle
public class HelloWorldHttpVerticle extends GroovyVerticle {
public void start(Future<Void> future) {
println "starting"
vertx.deployVerticle("v.rb",
{ res ->
if (res.succeeded()) {
future.complete()
} else {
future.fail()
}
})
}
public void stop(Future<Void> future) {
println("stopping")
future.complete()
}
}

Important
Note

Notice that depending your implementation choice, the Futureclass is different. Groovy verticle implemented as script are
using io.vertx.groovy.core.Future, while classes are using io.vertx.core.Future

You dont need to manually undeploy child verticles started by a verticle, in the verticles stop method. Vert.x will automatically
undeploy any child verticles when the parent is undeployed.

Verticle Types
http://vertx.io/docs/vertx-core/groovy/

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There are three different types of verticles:


Standard Verticles
These are the most common and useful type - they are always executed using an event loop thread. Well discuss this more in the
next section.
Worker Verticles
These run using a thread from the worker pool. An instance is never executed concurrently by more than one thread.
Multi-threaded worker verticles
These run using a thread from the worker pool. An instance can be executed concurrently by more than one thread.

Standard verticles
Standard verticles are assigned an event loop thread when they are created and the start method is called with that event loop. When you
call any other methods that takes a handler on a core API from an event loop then Vert.x will guarantee that those handlers, when called,
will be executed on the same event loop.
This means we can guarantee that all the code in your verticle instance is always executed on the same event loop (as long as you dont
create your own threads and call it!).
This means you can write all the code in your application as single threaded and let Vert.x worrying about the threading and scaling. No
more worrying about synchronized and volatile any more, and you also avoid many other cases of race conditions and deadlock so
prevalent when doing hand-rolled 'traditional' multi-threaded application development.

Worker verticles
A worker verticle is just like a standard verticle but its executed not using an event loop, but using a thread from the Vert.x worker
thread pool.
Worker verticles are designed for calling blocking code, as they wont block any event loops.
If you dont want to use a worker verticle to run blocking code, you can also run inline blocking code directly while on an event loop.
If you want to deploy a verticle as a worker verticle you do that with worker.
def options = [
worker:true
]
vertx.deployVerticle("com.mycompany.MyOrderProcessorVerticle", options)

Worker verticle instances are never executed concurrently by Vert.x by more than one thread, but can executed by different threads at
different times.
Multi-threaded worker verticles
A multi-threaded worker verticle is just like a normal worker verticle but it can be executed concurrently by different threads.
Multi-threaded worker verticles are an advanced feature and most applications will have no need for them. Because of the
Warning concurrency in these verticles you have to be very careful to keep the verticle in a consistent state using standard Java
techniques for multi-threaded programming.

Deploying verticles programmatically


You can deploy a verticle using one of the deployVerticlemethod, specifying a verticle name or you can pass in a verticle instance
you have already created yourself.
Note Deploying Verticle instances is Java only.
def myVerticle = new examples.CoreExamples.MyVerticle()
vertx.deployVerticle(myVerticle)

You can also deploy verticles by specifying the verticle name.


The verticle name is used to look up the specific VerticleFactorythat will be used to instantiate the actual verticle instance(s).
Different verticle factories are available for instantiating verticles in different languages and for various other reasons such as loading
services and getting verticles from Maven at run-time.
This allows you to deploy verticles written in any language from any other language that Vert.x supports.
http://vertx.io/docs/vertx-core/groovy/

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Heres an example of deploying some different types of verticles:


// Deploy a Java verticle - the name is the fully qualified class name of the verticle class
vertx.deployVerticle("com.mycompany.MyOrderProcessorVerticle")
// Deploy a JavaScript verticle
vertx.deployVerticle("verticles/myverticle.js")
// Deploy a Ruby verticle verticle
vertx.deployVerticle("verticles/my_verticle.rb")

Rules for mapping a verticle name to a verticle factory


When deploying verticle(s) using a name, the name is used to select the actual verticle factory that will instantiate the verticle(s).
Verticle names can have a prefix - which is a string followed by a colon, which if present will be used to look-up the factory, e.g.
js:foo.js // Use the JavaScript verticle factory
groovy:com.mycompany.SomeGroovyCompiledVerticle // Use the Groovy verticle factory
service:com.mycompany:myorderservice // Uses the service verticle factory

If no prefix is present, Vert.x will look for a suffix and use that to lookup the factory, e.g.
foo.js // Will also use the JavaScript verticle factory
SomeScript.groovy // Will use the Groovy verticle factory

If no prefix or suffix is present, Vert.x will assume its a Java fully qualified class name (FQCN) and try and instantiate that.

How are Verticle Factories located?


Most Verticle factories are loaded from the classpath and registered at Vert.x startup.
You can also programmatically register and unregister verticle factories using registerVerticleFactoryand
unregisterVerticleFactoryif you wish.

Waiting for deployment to complete


Verticle deployment is asynchronous and may complete some time after the call to deploy has returned.
If you want to be notified when deployment is complete you can deploy specifying a completion handler:
vertx.deployVerticle("com.mycompany.MyOrderProcessorVerticle", { res ->
if (res.succeeded()) {
println("Deployment id is: ${res.result()}")
} else {
println("Deployment failed!")
}
})

The completion handler will be passed a result containing the deployment ID string, if deployment succeeded.
This deployment ID can be used later if you want to undeploy the deployment.

Undeploying verticle deployments


Deployments can be undeployed with undeploy.
Un-deployment is itself asynchronous so if you want to be notified when un-deployment is complete you can deploy specifying a
completion handler:
vertx.undeploy(deploymentID, { res ->
if (res.succeeded()) {
println("Undeployed ok")
} else {
println("Undeploy failed!")
}
})

Specifying number of verticle instances


When deploying a verticle using a verticle name, you can specify the number of verticle instances that you want to deploy:
def options = [
instances:16
]
vertx.deployVerticle("com.mycompany.MyOrderProcessorVerticle", options)

http://vertx.io/docs/vertx-core/groovy/

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This is useful for scaling easily across multiple cores. For example you might have a web-server verticle to deploy and multiple cores on
your machine, so you want to deploy multiple instances to take utilise all the cores.

Passing configuration to a verticle


Configuration in the form of Map can be passed to a verticle at deployment time:
def config = [
name:"tim",
directory:"/blah"
]
def options = [ "config" : config ];
vertx.deployVerticle("com.mycompany.MyOrderProcessorVerticle", options);

This configuration is then available via the Context, The configuration is returned as a Map object so you can retrieve data as follows:
println vertx.getOrCreateContext().config()["name"]

Note The configuration can also be a JsonObjectobject.

Accessing environment variables in a Verticle


Environment variables and system properties are accessible using the Java API:
println System.getProperty("foo")
println System.getenv("HOME")

Verticle Isolation Groups


By default, Vert.x has a flat classpath. I.e, when Vert.x deploys verticles it does so with the current classloader - it doesnt create a new
one. In the majority of cases this is the simplest, clearest and sanest thing to do.
However, in some cases you may want to deploy a verticle so the classes of that verticle are isolated from others in your application.
This might be the case, for example, if you want to deploy two different versions of a verticle with the same class name in the same
Vert.x instance, or if you have two different verticles which use different versions of the same jar library.
When using an isolation group you provide a list of the class names that you want isolated using isolatedClasses- an entry can be a
fully qualified classname such as com.mycompany.myproject.engine.MyClassor it can be a wildcard which will match any classes in
a package and any sub-packages, e.g. com.mycompany.myproject.*would match any classes in the package
com.mycompany.myprojector any sub-packages.
Please note that only the classes that match will be isolated - any other classes will be loaded by the current class loader.
Extra classpath entries can also be provided with extraClasspathso if you want to load classes or resources that arent already present
on the main classpath you can add this.
Warning Use this feature with caution. Class-loaders can be a can of worms, and can make debugging difficult, amongst other things.
Heres an example of using an isolation group to isolate a verticle deployment.
def options = [
isolationGroup:"mygroup"
]
options.isolatedClasses = ["com.mycompany.myverticle.*", "com.mycompany.somepkg.SomeClass", "org.somelibrary.*"]
vertx.deployVerticle("com.mycompany.myverticle.VerticleClass", options)

High Availability
Verticles can be deployed with High Availability (HA) enabled. In that context, when a verticle is deployed on a vert.x instance that
dies abruptly, the verticle is redeployed on another vert.x instance from the cluster.
To run an verticle with the high availability enabled, just append the -haswitch:
vertx run my-verticle.js -ha

When enabling high availability, no need to add -cluster.


More details about the high availability feature and configuration in the High Availability and Fail-Over section.

Running Verticles from the command line


You can use Vert.x directly in your Maven or Gradle projects in the normal way by adding a dependency to the Vert.x core library and
hacking from there.
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However you can also run Vert.x verticles directly from the command line if you wish.
To do this you need to download and install a Vert.x distribution, and add the bindirectory of the installation to your PATHenvironment
variable. Also make sure you have a Java 8 JDK on your PATH.
Note The JDK is required to support on the fly compilation of Java code.
You can now run verticles by using the vertx runcommand. Here are some examples:
# Run a JavaScript verticle
vertx run my_verticle.js
# Run a Ruby verticle
vertx run a_n_other_verticle.rb
# Run a Groovy script verticle, clustered
vertx run FooVerticle.groovy -cluster

You can even run Java source verticles without compiling them first!
vertx run SomeJavaSourceFile.java

Vert.x will compile the Java source file on the fly before running it. This is really useful for quickly prototyping verticles and great for
demos. No need to set-up a Maven or Gradle build first to get going!
For full information on the various options available when executing vertxon the command line, type vertxat the command line.

Causing Vert.x to exit


Threads maintained by Vert.x instances are not daemon threads so they will prevent the JVM from exiting.
If you are embedding Vert.x and you have finished with it, you can call closeto close it down.
This will shut-down all internal thread pools and close other resources, and will allow the JVM to exit.

The Context object


When Vert.x provides an event to a handler or calls the start or stop methods of a Verticle, the execution is associated with a Context.
Usually a context is an event-loop context and is tied to a specific event loop thread. So executions for that context always occur on
that exact same event loop thread. In the case of worker verticles and running inline blocking code a worker context will be associated
with the execution which will use a thread from the worker thread pool.
To retrieve the context, use the getOrCreateContextmethod:
def context = vertx.getOrCreateContext()

If the current thread has a context associated with it, it reuses the context object. If not a new instance of context is created. You can test
the type of context you have retrieved:
import io.vertx.groovy.core.Context
def context = vertx.getOrCreateContext()
if (context.isEventLoopContext()) {
println("Context attached to Event Loop")
} else if (context.isWorkerContext()) {
println("Context attached to Worker Thread")
} else if (context.isMultiThreadedWorkerContext()) {
println("Context attached to Worker Thread - multi threaded worker")
} else if (!Context.isOnVertxThread()) {
println("Context not attached to a thread managed by vert.x")
}

When you have retrieved the context object, you can run code in this context asynchronously. In other words, you submit a task that will
be eventually run in the same context, but later:
vertx.getOrCreateContext().runOnContext({ v ->
println("This will be executed asynchronously in the same context")
})

When several handlers run in the same context, they may want to share data. The context object offers methods to store and retrieve data
shared in the context. For instance, it lets you pass data to some action run with runOnContext:
def context = vertx.getOrCreateContext()
context.put("data", "hello")
context.runOnContext({ v ->
def hello = context.get("data")
})

The context object also let you access verticle configuration using the configmethod. Check the Passing configuration to a verticle
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section for more details about this configuration.

Executing periodic and delayed actions


Its very common in Vert.x to want to perform an action after a delay, or periodically.
In standard verticles you cant just make the thread sleep to introduce a delay, as that will block the event loop thread.
Instead you use Vert.x timers. Timers can be one-shot or periodic. Well discuss both
One-shot Timers
A one shot timer calls an event handler after a certain delay, expressed in milliseconds.
To set a timer to fire once you use setTimermethod passing in the delay and a handler
def timerID = vertx.setTimer(1000, { id ->
println("And one second later this is printed")
})
println("First this is printed")

The return value is a unique timer id which can later be used to cancel the timer. The handler is also passed the timer id.
Periodic Timers
You can also set a timer to fire periodically by using setPeriodic.
There will be an initial delay equal to the period.
The return value of setPeriodicis a unique timer id (long). This can be later used if the timer needs to be cancelled.
The argument passed into the timer event handler is also the unique timer id:
Keep in mind that the timer will fire on a periodic basis. If your periodic treatment takes a long amount of time to proceed, your timer
events could run continuously or even worse : stack up.
In this case, you should consider using setTimerinstead. Once your treatment has finished, you can set the next timer.
def timerID = vertx.setPeriodic(1000, { id ->
println("And every second this is printed")
})
println("First this is printed")

Cancelling timers
To cancel a periodic timer, call cancelTimerspecifying the timer id. For example:
vertx.cancelTimer(timerID)

Automatic clean-up in verticles


If youre creating timers from inside verticles, those timers will be automatically closed when the verticle is undeployed.

The Event Bus


The event busis the nervous system of Vert.x.
There is a single event bus instance for every Vert.x instance and it is obtained using the method eventBus.
The event bus allows different parts of your application to communicate with each other irrespective of what language they are written
in, and whether theyre in the same Vert.x instance, or in a different Vert.x instance.
It can even be bridged to allow client side JavaScript running in a browser to communicate on the same event bus.
The event bus forms a distributed peer-to-peer messaging system spanning multiple server nodes and multiple browsers.
The event bus supports publish/subscribe, point to point, and request-response messaging.
The event bus API is very simple. It basically involves registering handlers, unregistering handlers and sending and publishing
messages.
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First some theory:

The Theory
Addressing
Messages are sent on the event bus to an address.
Vert.x doesnt bother with any fancy addressing schemes. In Vert.x an address is simply a string. Any string is valid. However it is wise
to use some kind of scheme, e.g. using periods to demarcate a namespace.
Some examples of valid addresses are europe.news.feed1, acme.games.pacman, sausages, and X.
Handlers
Messages are received in handlers. You register a handler at an address.
Many different handlers can be registered at the same address.
A single handler can be registered at many different addresses.
Publish / subscribe messaging
The event bus supports publishing messages.
Messages are published to an address. Publishing means delivering the message to all handlers that are registered at that address.
This is the familiar publish/subscribe messaging pattern.
Point to point and Request-Response messaging
The event bus also supports point to point messaging.
Messages are sent to an address. Vert.x will then route it to just one of the handlers registered at that address.
If there is more than one handler registered at the address, one will be chosen using a non-strict round-robin algorithm.
With point to point messaging, an optional reply handler can be specified when sending the message.
When a message is received by a recipient, and has been handled, the recipient can optionally decide to reply to the message. If they do
so the reply handler will be called.
When the reply is received back at the sender, it too can be replied to. This can be repeated ad-infinitum, and allows a dialog to be setup between two different verticles.
This is a common messaging pattern called the request-response pattern.
Best-effort delivery
Vert.x does its best to deliver messages and wont consciously throw them away. This is called best-effort delivery.
However, in case of failure of all or parts of the event bus, there is a possibility messages will be lost.
If your application cares about lost messages, you should code your handlers to be idempotent, and your senders to retry after recovery.
Types of messages
Out of the box Vert.x allows any primitive/simple type, String, or buffersto be sent as messages.
However its a convention and common practice in Vert.x to send messages as JSON
JSON is very easy to create, read and parse in all the languages that Vert.x supports so it has become a kind of lingua franca for Vert.x.
However you are not forced to use JSON if you dont want to.
The event bus is very flexible and also supports sending arbitrary objects over the event bus. You do this by defining a codecfor the
objects you want to send.

The Event Bus API


Lets jump into the API
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Getting the event bus


You get a reference to the event bus as follows:
def eb = vertx.eventBus()

There is a single instance of the event bus per Vert.x instance.


Registering Handlers
This simplest way to register a handler is using consumer. Heres an example:
def eb = vertx.eventBus()
eb.consumer("news.uk.sport", { message ->
println("I have received a message: ${message.body()}")
})

When a message arrives for your handler, your handler will be called, passing in the message.
The object returned from call to consumer() is an instance of MessageConsumer
This object can subsequently be used to unregister the handler, or use the handler as a stream.
Alternatively you can use consumerto to return a MessageConsumer with no handler set, and then set the handler on that. For example:
def eb = vertx.eventBus()
def consumer = eb.consumer("news.uk.sport")
consumer.handler({ message ->
println("I have received a message: ${message.body()}")
})

When registering a handler on a clustered event bus, it can take some time for the registration to reach all nodes of the cluster.
If you want to be notified when this has completed, you can register a completion handleron the MessageConsumer object.
consumer.completionHandler({ res ->
if (res.succeeded()) {
println("The handler registration has reached all nodes")
} else {
println("Registration failed!")
}
})

Un-registering Handlers
To unregister a handler, call unregister.
If you are on a clustered event bus, un-registering can take some time to propagate across the nodes, if you want to be notified when this
is complete use unregister.
consumer.unregister({ res ->
if (res.succeeded()) {
println("The handler un-registration has reached all nodes")
} else {
println("Un-registration failed!")
}
})

Publishing messages
Publishing a message is simple. Just use publishspecifying the address to publish it to.
eventBus.publish("news.uk.sport", "Yay! Someone kicked a ball")

That message will then be delivered to all handlers registered against the address news.uk.sport.
Sending messages
Sending a message will result in only one handler registered at the address receiving the message. This is the point to point messaging
pattern. The handler is chosen in a non-strict round-robin fashion.
You can send a message with send
eventBus.send("news.uk.sport", "Yay! Someone kicked a ball")

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Setting headers on messages


Messages sent over the event bus can also contain headers.
This can be specified by setting options when sending or publishing:
def options = [
headers: [
"some-header" : "some-value"
]
]
vertx.eventBus().send("news.uk.sport", "Yay! Someone kicked a ball", options);

On the other side, a consumer can retrieve the headers as follows:


vertx.eventBus().consumer("news.uk.sport", { e ->
println e.headers()["some-header"];
});

The Message object


The object you receive in a message handler is a Message.
The bodyof the message corresponds to the object that was sent or published.
The headers of the message are available with headers.
Replying to messages
Sometimes after you send a message you want to receive a reply from the recipient. This is known as the request-response pattern.
To do this you can specify a reply handler when sending the message.
When the receiver receives the message they can reply to it by calling reply.
When this happens it causes a reply to be sent back to the sender and the reply handler is invoked with the reply.
An example will make this clear:
The receiver:
def consumer = eventBus.consumer("news.uk.sport")
consumer.handler({ message ->
println("I have received a message: ${message.body()}")
message.reply("how interesting!")
})

The sender:
eventBus.send("news.uk.sport", "Yay! Someone kicked a ball across a patch of grass", { ar ->
if (ar.succeeded()) {
println("Received reply: ${ar.result().body()}")
}
})

The replies themselves can also be replied to so you can create a dialog between two different parties consisting of multiple rounds.
Sending with timeouts
When sending a message with a reply handler you can specify a timeout in the DeliveryOptions.
If a reply is not received within that time, the reply handler will be called with a failure.
The default timeout is 30 seconds.
Send Failures
Message sends can fail for other reasons, including:
There are no handlers available to send the message to
The recipient has explicitly failed the message using fail
In all cases the reply handler will be called with the specific failure.

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Message Codecs
Message codecs are available exclusively with the Java api.
Clustered Event Bus
The event bus doesnt just exist in a single Vert.x instance. By clustering different Vert.x instances together on your network they can
form a single, distributed, event bus.
Clustering programmatically
If youre creating your Vert.x instance programmatically you get a clustered event bus by configuring the Vert.x instance as clustered;
import io.vertx.groovy.core.Vertx
def options = [:]
Vertx.clusteredVertx(options, { res ->
if (res.succeeded()) {
def vertx = res.result()
def eventBus = vertx.eventBus()
println("We now have a clustered event bus: ${eventBus}")
} else {
println("Failed: ${res.cause()}")
}
})

You should also make sure you have a ClusterManagerimplementation on your classpath, for example the default
HazelcastClusterManager.
Clustering on the command line
You can run Vert.x clustered on the command line with
vertx run my-verticle.js -cluster

Automatic clean-up in verticles


If youre registering event bus handlers from inside verticles, those handlers will be automatically unregistered when the verticle is
undeployed.

JSON
To manipulate JSON object, Vert.x proposes its own implementation of JsonObjectand JsonArray.
This is because, unlike some other languages, Java does not have first class support for JSON.
When developping a vert.x application with Groovy, you can rely on these two classes, or use the (JSON support from Groovy. This
section explains how to use the Vert.x classes.
Note Most vert.x methods taking a JSON object as argument in their Java version, take a map instead.

JSON objects
The JsonObjectclass represents JSON objects.
A JSON object is basically just a map which has string keys and values can be of one of the JSON supported types (string, number,
boolean).
JSON objects also support nullvalues.
Creating JSON objects
Empty JSON objects can be created with the default constructor.
You can create a JSON object from a string or g-string JSON representation as follows:
def object = new JsonObject("{\"foo\":\"bar\"}")
def object2 = new JsonObject("""
{
"foo": "bar"
}
""")

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In Groovy its also convenient to create a JSON object from a map:


def map = [ "foo" : "bar" ]
def json = new JsonObject(map)

Nested maps are transformed to nested JSON objects.


Putting entries into a JSON object
Use the putmethods to put values into the JSON object.
The method invocations can be chained because of the fluent API:
def object = new JsonObject()
object.put("foo", "bar").put("num", 123).put("mybool", true)

Getting values from a JSON object


You get values from a JSON object using the getXXXmethods, for example:
dev val1 = jsonObject.getString("some-key")
def val2 = jsonObject.getInteger("some-other-key")

Encoding the JSON object to a String


You use encodeto encode the object to a String form. There is also a encodePrettilythat makes the output pretty (understand multiline and indented).

JSON arrays
The JsonArrayclass represents JSON arrays.
A JSON array is a sequence of values (string, number, boolean).
JSON arrays can also contain nullvalues.
Creating JSON arrays
Empty JSON arrays can be created with the default constructor.
You can create a JSON array from a string JSON representation or a map as follows:
def object = new JsonObject("""{foo:["bar", "baz"}""")
def object2 = new JsonObject(["foo": ["bar", "baz"]])

Adding entries into a JSON array


You add entries to a JSON array using the addmethods.
def array = new JsonArray()
array.add("foo").add(123).add(false)

Getting values from a JSON array


You get values from a JSON array using the getXXXmethods, for example:
def val = array.getString(0)
def intVal = array.getInteger(1)
def boolVal = array.getBoolean(2)

Encoding the JSON array to a String


You use encodeto encode the array to a String form. There is also a encodePrettilythat makes the output pretty (understand multiline and indented).

Buffers
Most data is shuffled around inside Vert.x using buffers.
A buffer is a sequence of zero or more bytes that can read from or written to and which expands automatically as necessary to
accommodate any bytes written to it. You can perhaps think of a buffer as smart byte array.
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Creating buffers
Buffers can create by using one of the static Buffer.buffermethods.
Buffers can be initialised from strings or byte arrays, or empty buffers can be created.
Here are some examples of creating buffers:
Create a new empty buffer:
import io.vertx.groovy.core.buffer.Buffer
def buff = Buffer.buffer()

Create a buffer from a String. The String will be encoded in the buffer using UTF-8.
import io.vertx.groovy.core.buffer.Buffer
def buff = Buffer.buffer("some string")

Create a buffer from a String: The String will be encoded using the specified encoding, e.g:
import io.vertx.groovy.core.buffer.Buffer
def buff = Buffer.buffer("some string", "UTF-16")

Create a buffer with an initial size hint. If you know your buffer will have a certain amount of data written to it you can create the buffer
and specify this size. This makes the buffer initially allocate that much memory and is more efficient than the buffer automatically
resizing multiple times as data is written to it.
Note that buffers created this way are empty. It does not create a buffer filled with zeros up to the specified size.
import io.vertx.groovy.core.buffer.Buffer
def buff = Buffer.buffer(10000)

Writing to a Buffer
There are two ways to write to a buffer: appending, and random access. In either case buffers will always expand automatically to
encompass the bytes. Its not possible to get an IndexOutOfBoundsExceptionwith a buffer.
Appending to a Buffer
To append to a buffer, you use the appendXXXmethods. Append methods exist for appending various different types.
The return value of the appendXXXmethods is the buffer itself, so these can be chained:
import io.vertx.groovy.core.buffer.Buffer
def buff = Buffer.buffer()
buff.appendInt(123).appendString("hello\n")
socket.write(buff)

Random access buffer writes


You can also write into the buffer at a specific index, by using the setXXXmethods. Set methods exist for various different data types.
All the set methods take an index as the first argument - this represents the position in the buffer where to start writing the data.
The buffer will always expand as necessary to accommodate the data.
import io.vertx.groovy.core.buffer.Buffer
def buff = Buffer.buffer()
buff.setInt(1000, 123)
buff.setString(0, "hello")

Reading from a Buffer


Data is read from a buffer using the getXXXmethods. Get methods exist for various datatypes. The first argument to these methods is an
index in the buffer from where to get the data.
import io.vertx.groovy.core.buffer.Buffer
def buff = Buffer.buffer()
for (def i = 0;i < buff.length();4) {
println("int value at ${i} is ${buff.getInt(i)}")
}

Buffer length
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Use lengthto obtain the length of the buffer. The length of a buffer is the index of the byte in the buffer with the largest index + 1.

Copying buffers
Use copyto make a copy of the buffer

Slicing buffers
A sliced buffer is a new buffer which backs onto the original buffer, i.e. it does not copy the underlying data. Use sliceto create a
sliced buffers

Buffer re-use
After writing a buffer to a socket or other similar place, they cannot be re-used.

Writing TCP servers and clients


Vert.x allows you to easily write non blocking TCP clients and servers.

Creating a TCP server


The simplest way to create a TCP server, using all default options is as follows:
def server = vertx.createNetServer()

Configuring a TCP server


If you dont want the default, a server can be configured by passing in a NetServerOptionsinstance when creating it:
def options = [
port:4321
]
def server = vertx.createNetServer(options)

Start the Server Listening


To tell the server to listen for incoming requests you use one of the listenalternatives.
To tell the server to listen at the host and port as specified in the options:
def server = vertx.createNetServer()
server.listen()

Or to specify the host and port in the call to listen, ignoring what is configured in the options:
def server = vertx.createNetServer()
server.listen(1234, "localhost")

The default host is 0.0.0.0which means 'listen on all available addresses' and the default port is 0, which is a special value that
instructs the server to find a random unused local port and use that.
The actual bind is asynchronous so the server might not actually be listening until some time after the call to listen has returned.
If you want to be notified when the server is actually listening you can provide a handler to the listencall. For example:
def server = vertx.createNetServer()
server.listen(1234, "localhost", { res ->
if (res.succeeded()) {
println("Server is now listening!")
} else {
println("Failed to bind!")
}
})

Listening on a random port


If 0is used as the listening port, the server will find an unused random port to listen on.
To find out the real port the server is listening on you can call actualPort.
def server = vertx.createNetServer()
server.listen(0, "localhost", { res ->
if (res.succeeded()) {
println("Server is now listening on actual port: ${server.actualPort()}")

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} else {
println("Failed to bind!")
}
})

Getting notified of incoming connections


To be notified when a connection is made you need to set a connectHandler:
def server = vertx.createNetServer()
server.connectHandler({ socket ->
// Handle the connection in here
})

When a connection is made the handler will be called with an instance of NetSocket.
This is a socket-like interface to the actual connection, and allows you to read and write data as well as do various other things like close
the socket.

Reading data from the socket


To read data from the socket you set the handleron the socket.
This handler will be called with an instance of Bufferevery time data is received on the socket.
def server = vertx.createNetServer()
server.connectHandler({ socket ->
socket.handler({ buffer ->
println("I received some bytes: ${buffer.length()}")
})
})

Writing data to a socket


You write to a socket using one of write.
import io.vertx.groovy.core.buffer.Buffer
// Write a buffer
def buffer = Buffer.buffer().appendFloat(12.34f).appendInt(123)
socket.write(buffer)
// Write a string in UTF-8 encoding
socket.write("some data")
// Write a string using the specified encoding
socket.write("some data", "UTF-16")

Write operations are asynchronous and may not occur until some time after the call to write has returned.

Closed handler
If you want to be notified when a socket is closed, you can set a closeHandleron it:
socket.closeHandler({ v ->
println("The socket has been closed")
})

Handling exceptions
You can set an exceptionHandlerto receive any exceptions that happen on the socket.

Event bus write handler


Every socket automatically registers a handler on the event bus, and when any buffers are received in this handler, it writes them to
itself.
This enables you to write data to a socket which is potentially in a completely different verticle or even in a different Vert.x instance by
sending the buffer to the address of that handler.
The address of the handler is given by writeHandlerID

Local and remote addresses


The local address of a NetSocketcan be retrieved using localAddress.
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The remote address, (i.e. the address of the other end of the connection) of a NetSocketcan be retrieved using remoteAddress.

Sending files
Files can be written to the socket directly using sendFile. This can be a very efficient way to send files, as it can be handled by the OS
kernel directly where supported by the operating system.
socket.sendFile("myfile.dat")

Streaming sockets
Instances of NetSocketare also ReadStreamand WriteStreaminstances so they can be used to pump data to or from other read and
write streams.
See the chapter on streams and pumps for more information.

Upgrading connections to SSL/TLS


A non SSL/TLS connection can be upgraded to SSL/TLS using upgradeToSsl.
The server or client must be configured for SSL/TLS for this to work correctly. Please see the chapter on SSL/TLS for more
information.

Closing a TCP Server


Call closeto close the server. Closing the server closes any open connections and releases all server resources.
The close is actually asynchronous and might not complete until some time after the call has returned. If you want to be notified when
the actual close has completed then you can pass in a handler.
This handler will then be called when the close has fully completed.
server.close({ res ->
if (res.succeeded()) {
println("Server is now closed")
} else {
println("close failed")
}
})

Automatic clean-up in verticles


If youre creating TCP servers and clients from inside verticles, those servers and clients will be automatically closed when the verticle
is undeployed.

Scaling - sharing TCP servers


The handlers of any TCP server are always executed on the same event loop thread.
This means that if you are running on a server with a lot of cores, and you only have this one instance deployed then you will have at
most one core utilised on your server.
In order to utilise more cores of your server you will need to deploy more instances of the server.
You can instantiate more instances programmatically in your code:
// Create a few instances so we can utilise cores
for (def i = 0;i < 10;i++) {
def server = vertx.createNetServer()
server.connectHandler({ socket ->
socket.handler({ buffer ->
// Just echo back the data
socket.write(buffer)
})
})
server.listen(1234, "localhost")
}

or, if you are using verticles you can simply deploy more instances of your server verticle by using the -instancesoption on the
command line:
vertx run com.mycompany.MyVerticle -instances 10

or when programmatically deploying your verticle


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def options = [
instances:10
]
vertx.deployVerticle("com.mycompany.MyVerticle", options)

Once you do this you will find the echo server works functionally identically to before, but all your cores on your server can be utilised
and more work can be handled.
At this point you might be asking yourself 'How can you have more than one server listening on the same host and port? Surely
you will get port conflicts as soon as you try and deploy more than one instance?'
Vert.x does a little magic here.*
When you deploy another server on the same host and port as an existing server it doesnt actually try and create a new server listening
on the same host/port.
Instead it internally maintains just a single server, and, as incoming connections arrive it distributes them in a round-robin fashion to any
of the connect handlers.
Consequently Vert.x TCP servers can scale over available cores while each instance remains single threaded.

Creating a TCP client


The simplest way to create a TCP client, using all default options is as follows:
def client = vertx.createNetClient()

Configuring a TCP client


If you dont want the default, a client can be configured by passing in a NetClientOptionsinstance when creating it:
def options = [
connectTimeout:10000
]
def client = vertx.createNetClient(options)

Making connections
To make a connection to a server you use connect, specifying the port and host of the server and a handler that will be called with a
result containing the NetSocketwhen connection is successful or with a failure if connection failed.
def options = [
connectTimeout:10000
]
def client = vertx.createNetClient(options)
client.connect(4321, "localhost", { res ->
if (res.succeeded()) {
println("Connected!")
def socket = res.result()
} else {
println("Failed to connect: ${res.cause().getMessage()}")
}
})

Configuring connection attempts


A client can be configured to automatically retry connecting to the server in the event that it cannot connect. This is configured with
reconnectIntervaland reconnectAttempts.
Note

Currently Vert.x will not attempt to reconnect if a connection fails, reconnect attempts and interval only apply to creating initial
connections.

def options = [:]


options.reconnectAttempts = 10.reconnectInterval = 500
def client = vertx.createNetClient(options)

By default, multiple connection attempts are disabled.

Configuring servers and clients to work with SSL/TLS


TCP clients and servers can be configured to use Transport Layer Security - earlier versions of TLS were known as SSL.
The APIs of the servers and clients are identical whether or not SSL/TLS is used, and its enabled by configuring the
NetClientOptionsor NetServerOptionsinstances used to create the servers or clients.
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Enabling SSL/TLS on the server


SSL/TLS is enabled with ssl.
By default it is disabled.
Specifying key/certificate for the server
SSL/TLS servers usually provide certificates to clients in order verify their identity to clients.
Certificates/keys can be configured for servers in several ways:
The first method is by specifying the location of a Java key-store which contains the certificate and private key.
Java key stores can be managed with the keytool utility which ships with the JDK.
The password for the key store should also be provided:
def options = [
ssl:true,
keyStoreOptions:[
path:"/path/to/your/server-keystore.jks",
password:"password-of-your-keystore"
]
]
def server = vertx.createNetServer(options)

Alternatively you can read the key store yourself as a buffer and provide that directly:
def myKeyStoreAsABuffer = vertx.fileSystem().readFileBlocking("/path/to/your/server-keystore.jks")
def jksOptions = [
value:myKeyStoreAsABuffer,
password:"password-of-your-keystore"
]
def options = [
ssl:true,
keyStoreOptions:jksOptions
]
def server = vertx.createNetServer(options)

Key/certificate in PKCS#12 format (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PKCS_12), usually with the .pfxor the .p12extension can also be
loaded in a similar fashion than JKS key stores:
def options = [
ssl:true,
pfxKeyCertOptions:[
path:"/path/to/your/server-keystore.pfx",
password:"password-of-your-keystore"
]
]
def server = vertx.createNetServer(options)

Buffer configuration is also supported:


def myKeyStoreAsABuffer = vertx.fileSystem().readFileBlocking("/path/to/your/server-keystore.pfx")
def pfxOptions = [
value:myKeyStoreAsABuffer,
password:"password-of-your-keystore"
]
def options = [
ssl:true,
pfxKeyCertOptions:pfxOptions
]
def server = vertx.createNetServer(options)

Another way of providing server private key and certificate separately using .pemfiles.
def options = [
ssl:true,
pemKeyCertOptions:[
keyPath:"/path/to/your/server-key.pem",
certPath:"/path/to/your/server-cert.pem"
]
]
def server = vertx.createNetServer(options)

Buffer configuration is also supported:


def myKeyAsABuffer = vertx.fileSystem().readFileBlocking("/path/to/your/server-key.pem")
def myCertAsABuffer = vertx.fileSystem().readFileBlocking("/path/to/your/server-cert.pem")
def pemOptions = [

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keyValue:myKeyAsABuffer,
certValue:myCertAsABuffer
]
def options = [
ssl:true,
pemKeyCertOptions:pemOptions
]
def server = vertx.createNetServer(options)

Vert.x Core Manual &middot; Vert.x

Keep in mind that pem configuration, the private key is not crypted.
Specifying trust for the server
SSL/TLS servers can use a certificate authority in order to verify the identity of the clients.
Certificate authorities can be configured for servers in several ways:
Java trust stores can be managed with the keytool utility which ships with the JDK.
The password for the trust store should also be provided:
def options = [
ssl:true,
clientAuthRequired:true,
trustStoreOptions:[
path:"/path/to/your/truststore.jks",
password:"password-of-your-truststore"
]
]
def server = vertx.createNetServer(options)

Alternatively you can read the trust store yourself as a buffer and provide that directly:
def myTrustStoreAsABuffer = vertx.fileSystem().readFileBlocking("/path/to/your/truststore.jks")
def options = [
ssl:true,
clientAuthRequired:true,
trustStoreOptions:[
value:myTrustStoreAsABuffer,
password:"password-of-your-truststore"
]
]
def server = vertx.createNetServer(options)

Certificate authority in PKCS#12 format (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PKCS_12), usually with the .pfxor the .p12extension can also
be loaded in a similar fashion than JKS trust stores:
def options = [
ssl:true,
clientAuthRequired:true,
pfxTrustOptions:[
path:"/path/to/your/truststore.pfx",
password:"password-of-your-truststore"
]
]
def server = vertx.createNetServer(options)

Buffer configuration is also supported:


def myTrustStoreAsABuffer = vertx.fileSystem().readFileBlocking("/path/to/your/truststore.pfx")
def options = [
ssl:true,
clientAuthRequired:true,
pfxTrustOptions:[
value:myTrustStoreAsABuffer,
password:"password-of-your-truststore"
]
]
def server = vertx.createNetServer(options)

Another way of providing server certificate authority using a list .pemfiles.


def options = [
ssl:true,
clientAuthRequired:true,
pemTrustOptions:[
certPaths:[
"/path/to/your/server-ca.pem"
]
]
]
def server = vertx.createNetServer(options)

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Buffer configuration is also supported:


def myCaAsABuffer = vertx.fileSystem().readFileBlocking("/path/to/your/server-ca.pfx")
def options = [
ssl:true,
clientAuthRequired:true,
pemTrustOptions:[
certValues:[
myCaAsABuffer
]
]
]
def server = vertx.createNetServer(options)

Enabling SSL/TLS on the client


Net Clients can also be easily configured to use SSL. They have the exact same API when using SSL as when using standard sockets.
To enable SSL on a NetClient the function setSSL(true) is called.
Client trust configuration
If the trustALlis set to true on the client, then the client will trust all server certificates. The connection will still be encrypted but this
mode is vulnerable to 'man in the middle' attacks. I.e. you cant be sure who you are connecting to. Use this with caution. Default value
is false.
def options = [
ssl:true,
trustAll:true
]
def client = vertx.createNetClient(options)

If trustAllis not set then a client trust store must be configured and should contain the certificates of the servers that the client trusts.
Likewise server configuration, the client trust can be configured in several ways:
The first method is by specifying the location of a Java trust-store which contains the certificate authority.
It is just a standard Java key store, the same as the key stores on the server side. The client trust store location is set by using the
function pathon the jks options. If a server presents a certificate during connection which is not in the client trust store, the
connection attempt will not succeed.
def options = [
ssl:true,
trustStoreOptions:[
path:"/path/to/your/truststore.jks",
password:"password-of-your-truststore"
]
]
def client = vertx.createNetClient(options)

Buffer configuration is also supported:


def myTrustStoreAsABuffer = vertx.fileSystem().readFileBlocking("/path/to/your/truststore.jks")
def options = [
ssl:true,
trustStoreOptions:[
value:myTrustStoreAsABuffer,
password:"password-of-your-truststore"
]
]
def client = vertx.createNetClient(options)

Certificate authority in PKCS#12 format (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PKCS_12), usually with the .pfxor the .p12extension can also
be loaded in a similar fashion than JKS trust stores:
def options = [
ssl:true,
pfxTrustOptions:[
path:"/path/to/your/truststore.pfx",
password:"password-of-your-truststore"
]
]
def client = vertx.createNetClient(options)

Buffer configuration is also supported:


def myTrustStoreAsABuffer = vertx.fileSystem().readFileBlocking("/path/to/your/truststore.pfx")
def options = [
ssl:true,

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pfxTrustOptions:[
value:myTrustStoreAsABuffer,
password:"password-of-your-truststore"
]
]
def client = vertx.createNetClient(options)

Vert.x Core Manual &middot; Vert.x

Another way of providing server certificate authority using a list .pemfiles.


def options = [
ssl:true,
pemTrustOptions:[
certPaths:[
"/path/to/your/ca-cert.pem"
]
]
]
def client = vertx.createNetClient(options)

Buffer configuration is also supported:


def myTrustStoreAsABuffer = vertx.fileSystem().readFileBlocking("/path/to/your/ca-cert.pem")
def options = [
ssl:true,
pemTrustOptions:[
certValues:[
myTrustStoreAsABuffer
]
]
]
def client = vertx.createNetClient(options)

Specifying key/certificate for the client


If the server requires client authentication then the client must present its own certificate to the server when connecting. The client can
be configured in several ways:
The first method is by specifying the location of a Java key-store which contains the key and certificate. Again its just a regular Java
key store. The client keystore location is set by using the function pathon the jks options.
def options = [
ssl:true,
keyStoreOptions:[
path:"/path/to/your/client-keystore.jks",
password:"password-of-your-keystore"
]
]
def client = vertx.createNetClient(options)

Buffer configuration is also supported:


def myKeyStoreAsABuffer = vertx.fileSystem().readFileBlocking("/path/to/your/client-keystore.jks")
def jksOptions = [
value:myKeyStoreAsABuffer,
password:"password-of-your-keystore"
]
def options = [
ssl:true,
keyStoreOptions:jksOptions
]
def client = vertx.createNetClient(options)

Key/certificate in PKCS#12 format (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PKCS_12), usually with the .pfxor the .p12extension can also be
loaded in a similar fashion than JKS key stores:
def options = [
ssl:true,
pfxKeyCertOptions:[
path:"/path/to/your/client-keystore.pfx",
password:"password-of-your-keystore"
]
]
def client = vertx.createNetClient(options)

Buffer configuration is also supported:


def myKeyStoreAsABuffer = vertx.fileSystem().readFileBlocking("/path/to/your/client-keystore.pfx")
def pfxOptions = [
value:myKeyStoreAsABuffer,
password:"password-of-your-keystore"
]
def options = [

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ssl:true,
pfxKeyCertOptions:pfxOptions
]
def client = vertx.createNetClient(options)

Vert.x Core Manual &middot; Vert.x

Another way of providing server private key and certificate separately using .pemfiles.
def options = [
ssl:true,
pemKeyCertOptions:[
keyPath:"/path/to/your/client-key.pem",
certPath:"/path/to/your/client-cert.pem"
]
]
def client = vertx.createNetClient(options)

Buffer configuration is also supported:


def myKeyAsABuffer = vertx.fileSystem().readFileBlocking("/path/to/your/client-key.pem")
def myCertAsABuffer = vertx.fileSystem().readFileBlocking("/path/to/your/client-cert.pem")
def pemOptions = [
keyValue:myKeyAsABuffer,
certValue:myCertAsABuffer
]
def options = [
ssl:true,
pemKeyCertOptions:pemOptions
]
def client = vertx.createNetClient(options)

Keep in mind that pem configuration, the private key is not crypted.
Revoking certificate authorities
Trust can be configured to use a certificate revocation list (CRL) for revoked certificates that should no longer be trusted. The crlPath
configures the crl list to use:
def options = [
ssl:true,
trustStoreOptions:trustOptions,
crlPaths:[
"/path/to/your/crl.pem"
]
]
def client = vertx.createNetClient(options)

Buffer configuration is also supported:


def myCrlAsABuffer = vertx.fileSystem().readFileBlocking("/path/to/your/crl.pem")
def options = [
ssl:true,
trustStoreOptions:trustOptions,
crlValues:[
myCrlAsABuffer
]
]
def client = vertx.createNetClient(options)

Configuring the Cipher suite


By default, the TLS configuration will uses the Cipher suite of the JVM running Vert.x. This Cipher suite can be configured with a suite
of enabled ciphers:
def options = [
ssl:true,
keyStoreOptions:keyStoreOptions,
enabledCipherSuites:[
"ECDHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256",
"ECDHE-ECDSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256",
"ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384",
"CDHE-ECDSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384"
]
]
def server = vertx.createNetServer(options)

Cipher suite can be specified on the NetServerOptionsor NetClientOptionsconfiguration.

Writing HTTP servers and clients


Vert.x allows you to easily write non blocking HTTP clients and servers.
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Creating an HTTP Server


The simplest way to create an HTTP server, using all default options is as follows:
def server = vertx.createHttpServer()

Configuring an HTTP server


If you dont want the default, a server can be configured by passing in a HttpServerOptionsinstance when creating it:
def options = [
maxWebsocketFrameSize:1000000
]
def server = vertx.createHttpServer(options)

Start the Server Listening


To tell the server to listen for incoming requests you use one of the listenalternatives.
To tell the server to listen at the host and port as specified in the options:
def server = vertx.createHttpServer()
server.listen()

Or to specify the host and port in the call to listen, ignoring what is configured in the options:
def server = vertx.createHttpServer()
server.listen(8080, "myhost.com")

The default host is 0.0.0.0which means 'listen on all available addresses' and the default port is 80.
The actual bind is asynchronous so the server might not actually be listening until some time after the call to listen has returned.
If you want to be notified when the server is actually listening you can provide a handler to the listencall. For example:
def server = vertx.createHttpServer()
server.listen(8080, "myhost.com", { res ->
if (res.succeeded()) {
println("Server is now listening!")
} else {
println("Failed to bind!")
}
})

Getting notified of incoming requests


To be notified when a request arrives you need to set a requestHandler:
def server = vertx.createHttpServer()
server.requestHandler({ request ->
// Handle the request in here
})

Handling requests
When a request arrives, the request handler is called passing in an instance of HttpServerRequest. This object represents the server
side HTTP request.
The handler is called when the headers of the request have been fully read.
If the request contains a body, that body will arrive at the server some time after the request handler has been called.
The server request object allows you to retrieve the uri, path, paramsand headers, amongst other things.
Each server request object is associated with one server response object. You use responseto get a reference to the
HttpServerResponseobject.
Heres a simple example of a server handling a request and replying with "hello world" to it.
vertx.createHttpServer().requestHandler({ request ->
request.response().end("Hello world")
}).listen(8080)

Request version
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The version of HTTP specified in the request can be retrieved with version
Request method
Use methodto retrieve the HTTP method of the request. (i.e. whether its GET, POST, PUT, DELETE, HEAD, OPTIONS, etc).
Request URI
Use urito retrieve the URI of the request.
Note that this is the actual URI as passed in the HTTP request, and its almost always a relative URI.
The URI is as defined in Section 5.1.2 of the HTTP specification - Request-URI
Request path
Use pathto return the path part of the URI
For example, if the request URI was:
a/b/c/page.html?param1=abc&param2=xyz

Then the path would be


/a/b/c/page.html

Request query
Use queryto return the query part of the URI
For example, if the request URI was:
a/b/c/page.html?param1=abc&param2=xyz

Then the query would be


param1=abc&param2=xyz

Request headers
Use headersto return the headers of the HTTP request.
This returns an instance of MultiMap- which is like a normal Map or Hash but allows multiple values for the same key - this is because
HTTP allows multiple header values with the same key.
It also has case-insensitive keys, that means you can do the following:
def headers = request.headers()
// Get the User-Agent:
println("User agent is ${headers.get("user-agent")}")
// You can also do this and get the same result:
println("User agent is ${headers.get("User-Agent")}")

Request parameters
Use paramsto return the parameters of the HTTP request.
Just like headersthis returns an instance of MultiMapas there can be more than one parameter with the same name.
Request parameters are sent on the request URI, after the path. For example if the URI was:
/page.html?param1=abc&param2=xyz

Then the parameters would contain the following:


param1: 'abc'
param2: 'xyz

Note that these request parameters are retrieved from the URL of the request. If you have form attributes that have been sent as part of
the submission of an HTML form submitted in the body of a multi-part/form-datarequest then they will not appear in the params
here.
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Remote address
The address of the sender of the request can be retrieved with remoteAddress.
Absolute URI
The URI passed in an HTTP request is usually relative. If you wish to retrieve the absolute URI corresponding to the request, you can
get it with absoluteURI
End handler
The endHandlerof the request is invoked when the entire request, including any body has been fully read.
Reading Data from the Request Body
Often an HTTP request contains a body that we want to read. As previously mentioned the request handler is called when just the
headers of the request have arrived so the request object does not have a body at that point.
This is because the body may be very large (e.g. a file upload) and we dont generally want to buffer the entire body in memory before
handing it to you, as that could cause the server to exhaust available memory.
To receive the body, you can use the handleron the request, this will get called every time a chunk of the request body arrives. Heres
an example:
request.handler({ buffer ->
println("I have received a chunk of the body of length ${buffer.length()}")
})

The object passed into the handler is a Buffer, and the handler can be called multiple times as data arrives from the network, depending
on the size of the body.
In some cases (e.g. if the body is small) you will want to aggregate the entire body in memory, so you could do the aggregation yourself
as follows:
import io.vertx.groovy.core.buffer.Buffer
// Create an empty buffer
def totalBuffer = Buffer.buffer()
request.handler({ buffer ->
println("I have received a chunk of the body of length ${buffer.length()}")
totalBuffer.appendBuffer(buffer)
})
request.endHandler({ v ->
println("Full body received, length = ${totalBuffer.length()}")
})

This is such a common case, that Vert.x provides a bodyHandlerto do this for you. The body handler is called once when all the body
has been received:
request.bodyHandler({ totalBuffer ->
println("Full body received, length = ${totalBuffer.length()}")
})

Pumping requests
The request object is a ReadStreamso you can pump the request body to any WriteStreaminstance.
See the chapter on streams and pumps for a detailed explanation.
Handling HTML forms
HTML forms can be submitted with either a content type of application/x-www-form-urlencodedor multipart/form-data.
For url encoded forms, the form attributes are encoded in the url, just like normal query parameters.
For multi-part forms they are encoded in the request body, and as such are not available until the entire body has been read from the
wire.
Multi-part forms can also contain file uploads.
If you want to retrieve the attributes of a multi-part form you should tell Vert.x that you expect to receive such a form before any of the
body is read by calling setExpectMultipartwith true, and then you should retrieve the actual attributes using formAttributesonce
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the entire body has been read:


server.requestHandler({ request ->
request.setExpectMultipart(true)
request.endHandler({ v ->
// The body has now been fully read, so retrieve the form attributes
def formAttributes = request.formAttributes()
})
})

Handling form file uploads


Vert.x can also handle file uploads which are encoded in a multi-part request body.
To receive file uploads you tell Vert.x to expect a multi-part form and set an uploadHandleron the request.
This handler will be called once for every upload that arrives on the server.
The object passed into the handler is a HttpServerFileUploadinstance.
server.requestHandler({ request ->
request.setExpectMultipart(true)
request.uploadHandler({ upload ->
println("Got a file upload ${upload.name()}")
})
})

File uploads can be large we dont provide the entire upload in a single buffer as that might result in memory exhaustion, instead, the
upload data is received in chunks:
request.uploadHandler({ upload ->
upload.handler({ chunk ->
println("Received a chunk of the upload of length ${chunk.length()}")
})
})

The upload object is a ReadStreamso you can pump the request body to any WriteStreaminstance. See the chapter on streams and
pumps for a detailed explanation.
If you just want to upload the file to disk somewhere you can use streamToFileSystem:
request.uploadHandler({ upload ->
upload.streamToFileSystem("myuploads_directory/${upload.filename()}")
})

Warning

Make sure you check the filename in a production system to avoid malicious clients uploading files to arbitrary places on
your filesystem. See security notes for more information.

Sending back responses


The server response object is an instance of HttpServerResponseand is obtained from the request with response.
You use the response object to write a response back to the HTTP client.
Setting status code and message
The default HTTP status code for a response is 200, representing OK.
Use setStatusCodeto set a different code.
You can also specify a custom status message with setStatusMessage.
If you dont specify a status message, the default one corresponding to the status code will be used.
Writing HTTP responses
To write data to an HTTP response, you use one the writeoperations.
These can be invoked multiple times before the response is ended. They can be invoked in a few ways:
With a single buffer:
def response = request.response()
response.write(buffer)

With a string. In this case the string will encoded using UTF-8 and the result written to the wire.
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def response = request.response()
response.write("hello world!")

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With a string and an encoding. In this case the string will encoded using the specified encoding and the result written to the wire.
def response = request.response()
response.write("hello world!", "UTF-16")

Writing to a response is asynchronous and always returns immediately after the write has been queued.
If you are just writing a single string or buffer to the HTTP response you can write it and end the response in a single call to the end
The first call to write results in the response header being being written to the response. Consequently, if you are not using HTTP
chunking then you must set the Content-Lengthheader before writing to the response, since it will be too late otherwise. If you are
using HTTP chunking you do not have to worry.
Ending HTTP responses
Once you have finished with the HTTP response you should endit.
This can be done in several ways:
With no arguments, the response is simply ended.
def response = request.response()
response.write("hello world!")
response.end()

It can also be called with a string or buffer in the same way writeis called. In this case its just the same as calling write with a string or
buffer followed by calling end with no arguments. For example:
def response = request.response()
response.end("hello world!")

Closing the underlying connection


You can close the underlying TCP connection with close.
Non keep-alive connections will be automatically closed by Vert.x when the response is ended.
Keep-alive connections are not automatically closed by Vert.x by default. If you want keep-alive connections to be closed after an idle
time, then you configure idleTimeout.
Setting response headers
HTTP response headers can be added to the response by adding them directly to the headers:
def response = request.response()
def headers = response.headers()
headers.set("content-type", "text/html")
headers.set("other-header", "wibble")

Or you can use putHeader


def response = request.response()
response.putHeader("content-type", "text/html").putHeader("other-header", "wibble")

Headers must all be added before any parts of the response body are written.
Chunked HTTP responses and trailers
Vert.x supports HTTP Chunked Transfer Encoding.
This allows the HTTP response body to be written in chunks, and is normally used when a large response body is being streamed to a
client and the total size is not known in advance.
You put the HTTP response into chunked mode as follows:
def response = request.response()
response.setChunked(true)

Default is non-chunked. When in chunked mode, each call to one of the writemethods will result in a new HTTP chunk being written
out.
When in chunked mode you can also write HTTP response trailers to the response. These are actually written in the final chunk of the
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response.
To add trailers to the response, add them directly to the trailers.
def response = request.response()
response.setChunked(true)
def trailers = response.trailers()
trailers.set("X-wibble", "woobble").set("X-quux", "flooble")

Or use putTrailer.
def response = request.response()
response.setChunked(true)
response.putTrailer("X-wibble", "woobble").putTrailer("X-quux", "flooble")

Serving files directly from disk


If you were writing a web server, one way to serve a file from disk would be to open it as an AsyncFileand pump it to the HTTP
response.
Or you could load it it one go using readFileand write it straight to the response.
Alternatively, Vert.x provides a method which allows you to serve a file from disk to an HTTP response in one operation. Where
supported by the underlying operating system this may result in the OS directly transferring bytes from the file to the socket without
being copied through user-space at all.
This is done by using sendFile, and is usually more efficient for large files, but may be slower for small files.
Heres a very simple web server that serves files from the file system using sendFile:
vertx.createHttpServer().requestHandler({ request ->
def file = ""
if (request.path() == "/") {
file = "index.html"
} else if (!request.path().contains("..")) {
file = request.path()
}
request.response().sendFile("web/${file}")
}).listen(8080)

Sending a file is asynchronous and may not complete until some time after the call has returned. If you want to be notified when the file
has been writen you can use sendFile
If you use sendFilewhile using HTTPS it will copy through user-space, since if the kernel is copying data directly from disk to
socket it doesnt give us an opportunity to apply any encryption.
If youre going to write web servers directly using Vert.x be careful that users cannot exploit the path to access files outside
Warning
the directory from which you want to serve them. It may be safer instead to use Vert.x Web.
Note

Pumping responses
The server response is a WriteStreaminstance so you can pump to it from any ReadStream, e.g. AsyncFile, NetSocket, WebSocketor
HttpServerRequest.
Heres an example which echoes the request body back in the response for any PUT methods. It uses a pump for the body, so it will
work even if the HTTP request body is much larger than can fit in memory at any one time:
import io.vertx.core.http.HttpMethod
import io.vertx.groovy.core.streams.Pump
vertx.createHttpServer().requestHandler({ request ->
def response = request.response()
if (request.method() == HttpMethod.PUT) {
response.setChunked(true)
Pump.pump(request, response).start()
request.endHandler({ v ->
response.end()
})
} else {
response.setStatusCode(400).end()
}
}).listen(8080)

HTTP Compression
Vert.x comes with support for HTTP Compression out of the box.
This means you are able to automatically compress the body of the responses before they are sent back to the client.
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If the client does not support HTTP compression the responses are sent back without compressing the body.
This allows to handle Client that support HTTP Compression and those that not support it at the same time.
To enable compression use can configure it with compressionSupported.
By default compression is not enabled.
When HTTP compression is enabled the server will check if the client incldes an Accept-Encodingheader which includes the
supported compressions. Commonly used are deflate and gzip. Both are supported by Vert.x.
If such a header is found the server will automatically compress the body of the response with one of the supported compressions and
send it back to the client.
Be aware that compression may be able to reduce network traffic but is more CPU-intensive.

Creating an HTTP client


You create an HttpClientinstance with default options as follows:
def client = vertx.createHttpClient()

If you want to configure options for the client, you create it as follows:
def options = [
keepAlive:false
]
def client = vertx.createHttpClient(options)

Making requests
The http client is very flexible and there are various ways you can make requests with it.
Often you want to make many requests to the same host/port with an http client. To avoid you repeating the host/port every time you
make a request you can configure the client with a default host/port:
// Set the default host
def options = [
defaultHost:"wibble.com"
]
// Can also set default port if you want...
def client = vertx.createHttpClient(options)
client.getNow("/some-uri", { response ->
println("Received response with status code ${response.statusCode()}")
})

Alternatively if you find yourself making lots of requests to different host/ports with the same client you can simply specify the
host/port when doing the request.
def client = vertx.createHttpClient()
// Specify both port and host name
client.getNow(8080, "myserver.mycompany.com", "/some-uri", { response ->
println("Received response with status code ${response.statusCode()}")
})
// This time use the default port 80 but specify the host name
client.getNow("foo.othercompany.com", "/other-uri", { response ->
println("Received response with status code ${response.statusCode()}")
})

Both methods of specifying host/port are supported for all the different ways of making requests with the client.
Simple requests with no request body
Often, youll want to make HTTP requests with no request body. This is usually the case with HTTP GET, OPTIONS and HEAD
requests.
The simplest way to do this with the Vert.x http client is using the methods prefixed with Now. For example getNow.
These methods create the http request and send it in a single method call and allow you to provide a handler that will be called with the
http response when it comes back.
def client = vertx.createHttpClient()
// Send a GET request
client.getNow("/some-uri", { response ->

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println("Received response with status code ${response.statusCode()}")
})
// Send a GET request
client.headNow("/other-uri", { response ->
println("Received response with status code ${response.statusCode()}")
})

Writing general requests


At other times you dont know the request method you want to send until run-time. For that use case we provide general purpose request
methods such as requestwhich allow you to specify the HTTP method at run-time:
import io.vertx.core.http.HttpMethod
def client = vertx.createHttpClient()
client.request(HttpMethod.GET, "some-uri", { response ->
println("Received response with status code ${response.statusCode()}")
}).end()
client.request(HttpMethod.POST, "foo-uri", { response ->
println("Received response with status code ${response.statusCode()}")
}).end("some-data")

Writing request bodies


Sometimes youll want to write requests which have a body, or perhaps you want to write headers to a request before sending it.
To do this you can call one of the specific request methods such as postor one of the general purpose request methods such as request.
These methods dont send the request immediately, but instead return an instance of HttpClientRequestwhich can be used to write to
the request body or write headers.
Here are some examples of writing a POST request with a body: m
def client = vertx.createHttpClient()
def request = client.post("some-uri", { response ->
println("Received response with status code ${response.statusCode()}")
})
// Now do stuff with the request
request.putHeader("content-length", "1000")
request.putHeader("content-type", "text/plain")
request.write(body)
// Make sure the request is ended when you're done with it
request.end()
// Or fluently:
client.post("some-uri", { response ->
println("Received response with status code ${response.statusCode()}")
}).putHeader("content-length", "1000").putHeader("content-type", "text/plain").write(body).end()
// Or event more simply:
client.post("some-uri", { response ->
println("Received response with status code ${response.statusCode()}")
}).putHeader("content-type", "text/plain").end(body)

Methods exist to write strings in UTF-8 encoding and in any specific encoding and to write buffers:
import io.vertx.groovy.core.buffer.Buffer
// Write string encoded in UTF-8
request.write("some data")
// Write string encoded in specific encoding
request.write("some other data", "UTF-16")
// Write a buffer
def buffer = Buffer.buffer()
buffer.appendInt(123).appendLong(245L)
request.write(buffer)

If you are just writing a single string or buffer to the HTTP request you can write it and end the request in a single call to the end
function.
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// Write string and end the request (send it) in a single call
request.end("some simple data")
// Write buffer and end the request (send it) in a single call
def buffer = Buffer.buffer().appendDouble(12.34d).appendLong(432L)
request.end(buffer)

When youre writing to a request, the first call to writewill result in the request headers being written out to the wire.
The actual write is asynchronous and might not occur until some time after the call has returned.
Non-chunked HTTP requests with a request body require a Content-Lengthheader to be provided.
Consequently, if you are not using chunked HTTP then you must set the Content-Lengthheader before writing to the request, as it will
be too late otherwise.
If you are calling one of the endmethods that take a string or buffer then Vert.x will automatically calculate and set the ContentLengthheader before writing the request body.
If you are using HTTP chunking a a Content-Lengthheader is not required, so you do not have to calculate the size up-front.
Writing request headers
You can write headers to a request using the headersmulti-map as follows:
// Write some headers using the headers() multimap
def headers = request.headers()
headers.set("content-type", "application/json").set("other-header", "foo")

The headers are an instance of MultiMapwhich provides operations for adding, setting and removing entries. Http headers allow more
than one value for a specific key.
You can also write headers using putHeader
// Write some headers using the putHeader method
request.putHeader("content-type", "application/json").putHeader("other-header", "foo")

If you wish to write headers to the request you must do so before any part of the request body is written.
Ending HTTP requests
Once you have finished with the HTTP request you must end it with one of the endoperations.
Ending a request causes any headers to be written, if they have not already been written and the request to be marked as complete.
Requests can be ended in several ways. With no arguments the request is simply ended:
request.end()

Or a string or buffer can be provided in the call to end. This is like calling writewith the string or buffer before calling endwith no
arguments
import io.vertx.groovy.core.buffer.Buffer
// End the request with a string
request.end("some-data")
// End it with a buffer
def buffer = Buffer.buffer().appendFloat(12.3f).appendInt(321)
request.end(buffer)

Chunked HTTP requests


Vert.x supports HTTP Chunked Transfer Encoding for requests.
This allows the HTTP request body to be written in chunks, and is normally used when a large request body is being streamed to the
server, whose size is not known in advance.
You put the HTTP request into chunked mode using setChunked.
In chunked mode each call to write will cause a new chunk to be written to the wire. In chunked mode there is no need to set the
Content-Lengthof the request up-front.
request.setChunked(true)
// Write some chunks

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for (def i = 0;i < 10;i++) {
request.write("this-is-chunk-${i}")
}

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request.end()

Request timeouts
You can set a timeout for a specific http request using setTimeout.
If the request does not return any data within the timeout period an exception will be passed to the exception handler (if provided) and
the request will be closed.
Handling exceptions
You can handle exceptions corresponding to a request by setting an exception handler on the HttpClientRequestinstance:
def request = client.post("some-uri", { response ->
println("Received response with status code ${response.statusCode()}")
})
request.exceptionHandler({ e ->
println("Received exception: ${e.getMessage()}")
e.printStackTrace()
})

This does not handle non 2xx response that need to be handled in the HttpClientResponsecode:
def request = client.post("some-uri", { response ->
if (response.statusCode() == 200) {
println("Everything fine")
return
}
if (response.statusCode() == 500) {
println("Unexpected behavior on the server side")
return
}
})
request.end()

Important XXXNowmethods cannot receive an exception handler.


Specifying a handler on the client request
Instead of providing a response handler in the call to create the client request object, alternatively, you can not provide a handler when
the request is created and set it later on the request object itself, using handler, for example:
def request = client.post("some-uri")
request.handler({ response ->
println("Received response with status code ${response.statusCode()}")
})

Using the request as a stream


The HttpClientRequestinstance is also a WriteStreamwhich means you can pump to it from any ReadStreaminstance.
For, example, you could pump a file on disk to a http request body as follows:
import io.vertx.groovy.core.streams.Pump
request.setChunked(true)
def pump = Pump.pump(file, request)
file.endHandler({ v ->
request.end()
})
pump.start()

Handling http responses


You receive an instance of HttpClientResponseinto the handler that you specify in of the request methods or by setting a handler
directly on the HttpClientRequestobject.
You can query the status code and the status message of the response with statusCodeand statusMessage.
client.getNow("some-uri", { response ->
// the status code - e.g. 200 or 404
println("Status code is ${response.statusCode()}")

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// the status message e.g. "OK" or "Not Found".
println("Status message is ${response.statusMessage()}")
})

Using the response as a stream


The HttpClientResponseinstance is also a ReadStreamwhich means you can pump it to any WriteStreaminstance.
Response headers and trailers
Http responses can contain headers. Use headersto get the headers.
The object returned is a MultiMapas HTTP headers can contain multiple values for single keys.
def contentType = response.headers().get("content-type")
def contentLength = response.headers().get("content-lengh")

Chunked HTTP responses can also contain trailers - these are sent in the last chunk of the response body.
You use trailersto get the trailers. Trailers are also a MultiMap.
Reading the request body
The response handler is called when the headers of the response have been read from the wire.
If the response has a body this might arrive in several pieces some time after the headers have been read. We dont wait for all the body
to arrive before calling the response handler as the response could be very large and we might be waiting a long time, or run out of
memory for large responses.
As parts of the response body arrive, the handleris called with a Bufferrepresenting the piece of the body:
client.getNow("some-uri", { response ->
response.handler({ buffer ->
println("Received a part of the response body: ${buffer}")
})
})

If you know the response body is not very large and want to aggregate it all in memory before handling it, you can either aggregate it
yourself:
import io.vertx.groovy.core.buffer.Buffer
client.getNow("some-uri", { response ->
// Create an empty buffer
def totalBuffer = Buffer.buffer()
response.handler({ buffer ->
println("Received a part of the response body: ${buffer.length()}")
totalBuffer.appendBuffer(buffer)
})
response.endHandler({ v ->
// Now all the body has been read
println("Total response body length is ${totalBuffer.length()}")
})
})

Or you can use the convenience bodyHandlerwhich is called with the entire body when the response has been fully read:
client.getNow("some-uri", { response ->
response.bodyHandler({ totalBuffer ->
// Now all the body has been read
println("Total response body length is ${totalBuffer.length()}")
})
})

Response end handler


The response endHandleris called when the entire response body has been read or immediately after the headers have been read and the
response handler has been called if there is no body.
Reading cookies from the response

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You can retrieve the list of cookies from a response using cookies.
Alternatively you can just parse the Set-Cookieheaders yourself in the response.
100-Continue handling
According to the HTTP 1.1 specification a client can set a header Expect: 100-Continueand send the request header before sending
the rest of the request body.
The server can then respond with an interim response status Status: 100 (Continue)to signify to the client that it is ok to send the
rest of the body.
The idea here is it allows the server to authorise and accept/reject the request before large amounts of data are sent. Sending large
amounts of data if the request might not be accepted is a waste of bandwidth and ties up the server in reading data that it will just
discard.
Vert.x allows you to set a continueHandleron the client request object
This will be called if the server sends back a Status: 100 (Continue)response to signify that it is ok to send the rest of the request.
This is used in conjunction with `sendHead`to send the head of the request.
Heres an example:
def request = client.put("some-uri", { response ->
println("Received response with status code ${response.statusCode()}")
})
request.putHeader("Expect", "100-Continue")
request.continueHandler({ v ->
// OK to send rest of body
request.write("Some data")
request.write("Some more data")
request.end()
})

Enabling compression on the client


The http client comes with support for HTTP Compression out of the box.
This means the client can let the remote http server know that it supports compression, and will be able to handle compressed response
bodies.
An http server is free to either compress with one of the supported compression algorithms or to send the body back without
compressing it at all. So this is only a hint for the Http server which it may ignore at will.
To tell the http server which compression is supported by the client it will include an Accept-Encodingheader with the supported
compression algorithm as value. Multiple compression algorithms are supported. In case of Vert.x this will result in the following
header added:
Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate

The server will choose then from one of these. You can detect if a server ompressed the body by checking for the Content-Encoding
header in the response sent back from it.
If the body of the response was compressed via gzip it will include for example the following header:
Content-Encoding: gzip

To enable compression set tryUseCompressionon the options used when creating the client.
By default compression is disabled.

Pooling and keep alive


Http keep alive allows http connections to be used for more than one request. This can be a more efficient use of connections when
youre making multiple requests to the same server.
The http client supports pooling of connections, allowing you to reuse connections between requests.
For pooling to work, keep alive must be true using keepAliveon the options used when configuring the client. The default value is true.
When keep alive is enabled. Vert.x will add a Connection: Keep-Aliveheader to each HTTP request sent.

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The maximum number of connections to pool for each server is configured using maxPoolSize
When making a request with pooling enabled, Vert.x will create a new connection if there are less than the maximum number of
connections already created for that server, otherwise it will add the request to a queue.
When a response returns, if there are pending requests for the server, then the connection will be reused, otherwise it will be closed.
This gives the benefits of keep alive when the client is loaded but means we dont keep connections hanging around unnecessarily when
there would be no benefits anyway.

Pipe-lining
The client also supports pipe-lining of requests on a connection.
Pipe-lining means another request is sent on the same connection before the response from the preceding one has returned. Pipe-lining is
not appropriate for all requests.
To enable pipe-lining, it must be enabled using pipelining. By default pipe-lining is disabled.
When pipe-lining is enabled requests will be written to connections without waiting for previous responses to return.
When pipe-line responses return at the client, the connection will be automatically closed when all in-flight responses have returned and
there are no outstanding pending requests to write.

Server sharing
When several HTTP servers listen on the same port, vert.x orchestrates the request handling using a round-robin strategy.
Lets take a verticle creating a HTTP server such as:
io.vertx.examples.http.sharing.HttpServerVerticle
vertx.createHttpServer().requestHandler({ request ->
request.response().end("Hello from server ${this}")
}).listen(8080)

This service is listening on the port 8080. So, when this verticle is instantiated multiple times as with: vertx run
io.vertx.examples.http.sharing.HttpServerVerticle -instances 2, whats happening ? If both verticles would bind to the same
port, you would receive a socket exception. Fortunately, vert.x is handling this case for you. When you deploy another server on the
same host and port as an existing server it doesnt actually try and create a new server listening on the same host/port. It binds only once
to the socket. When receiving a request it calls the server handlers following a round robin strategy.
Lets now imagine a client such as:
vertx.setPeriodic(100, { l ->
vertx.createHttpClient().getNow(8080, "localhost", "/", { resp ->
resp.bodyHandler({ body ->
println(body.toString("ISO-8859-1"))
})
})
})

Vert.x delegates the requests to one of the server sequentially:


Hello from i.v.e.h.s.HttpServerVerticle@1
Hello from i.v.e.h.s.HttpServerVerticle@2
Hello from i.v.e.h.s.HttpServerVerticle@1
Hello from i.v.e.h.s.HttpServerVerticle@2
...

Consequently the servers can scale over available cores while each Vert.x verticle instance remains strictly single threaded, and you
dont have to do any special tricks like writing load-balancers in order to scale your server on your multi-core machine.

Using HTTPS with Vert.x


Vert.x http servers and clients can be configured to use HTTPS in exactly the same way as net servers.
Please see configuring net servers to use SSL for more information.

WebSockets
WebSockets are a web technology that allows a full duplex socket-like connection between HTTP servers and HTTP clients (typically
browsers).
Vert.x supports WebSockets on both the client and server-side.
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WebSockets on the server


There are two ways of handling WebSockets on the server side.
WebSocket handler

The first way involves providing a websocketHandleron the server instance.


When a WebSocket connection is made to the server, the handler will be called, passing in an instance of ServerWebSocket.
server.websocketHandler({ websocket ->
println("Connected!")
})

You can choose to reject the WebSocket by calling reject.


server.websocketHandler({ websocket ->
if (websocket.path() == "/myapi") {
websocket.reject()
} else {
// Do something
}
})

Upgrading to WebSocket

The second way of handling WebSockets is to handle the HTTP Upgrade request that was sent from the client, and call upgradeon the
server request.
server.requestHandler({ request ->
if (request.path() == "/myapi") {
def websocket = request.upgrade()
// Do something
} else {
// Reject
request.response().setStatusCode(400).end()
}
})

The server WebSocket

The ServerWebSocketinstance enables you to retrieve the headers, pathpath}, queryand uriURI} of the HTTP request of the
WebSocket handshake.
WebSockets on the client
The Vert.x HttpClientsupports WebSockets.
You can connect a WebSocket to a server using one of the websocketoperations and providing a handler.
The handler will be called with an instance of WebSocketwhen the connection has been made:
client.websocket("/some-uri", { websocket ->
println("Connected!")
})

Writing messages to WebSockets


If you wish to write a single binary WebSocket message to the WebSocket you can do this with writeBinaryMessage:
import io.vertx.groovy.core.buffer.Buffer
// Write a simple message
def buffer = Buffer.buffer().appendInt(123).appendFloat(1.23f)
websocket.writeBinaryMessage(buffer)

If the WebSocket message is larger than the maximum websocket frame size as configured with maxWebsocketFrameSizethen Vert.x
will split it into multiple WebSocket frames before sending it on the wire.
Writing frames to WebSockets
A WebSocket message can be composed of multiple frames. In this case the first frame is either a binary or text frame followed by zero
or more continuation frames.
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The last frame in the message is marked as final.


To send a message consisting of multiple frames you create frames using WebSocketFrame.binaryFrame, WebSocketFrame.textFrame
or WebSocketFrame.continuationFrameand write them to the WebSocket using writeFrame.
Heres an example for binary frames:
import io.vertx.groovy.core.http.WebSocketFrame
def frame1 = WebSocketFrame.binaryFrame(buffer1, false)
websocket.writeFrame(frame1)
def frame2 = WebSocketFrame.continuationFrame(buffer2, false)
websocket.writeFrame(frame2)
// Write the final frame
def frame3 = WebSocketFrame.continuationFrame(buffer2, true)
websocket.writeFrame(frame3)

In many cases you just want to send a websocket message that consists of a single final frame, so we provide a couple of shortcut
methods to do that with writeFinalBinaryFrameand writeFinalTextFrame.
Heres an example:
import io.vertx.groovy.core.buffer.Buffer
// Send a websocket messages consisting of a single final text frame:
websocket.writeFinalTextFrame("Geronimo!")
// Send a websocket messages consisting of a single final binary frame:
def buff = Buffer.buffer().appendInt(12).appendString("foo")
websocket.writeFinalBinaryFrame(buff)

Reading frames from WebSockets


To read frames from a WebSocket you use the frameHandler.
The frame handler will be called with instances of WebSocketFramewhen a frame arrives, for example:
websocket.frameHandler({ frame ->
println("Received a frame of size!")
})

Closing WebSockets
Use closeto close the WebSocket connection when you have finished with it.
Streaming WebSockets
The WebSocketinstance is also a ReadStreamand a WriteStreamso it can be used with pumps.
When using a WebSocket as a write stream or a read stream it can only be used with WebSockets connections that are used with binary
frames that are no split over multiple frames.

Automatic clean-up in verticles


If youre creating http servers and clients from inside verticles, those servers and clients will be automatically closed when the verticle
is undeployed.

Using Shared Data with Vert.x


Shared data contains functionality that allows you to safely share data between different parts of your application, or different
applications in the same Vert.x instance or across a cluster of Vert.x instances.
Shared data includes local shared maps, distributed, cluster-wide maps, asynchronous cluster-wide locks and asynchronous cluster-wide
counters.

Local shared maps


Local shared mapsallow

you to share data safely between different event loops (e.g. different verticles) in the same Vert.x instance.

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Local shared maps only allow certain data types to be used as keys and values. Those types must either be immutable, or certain other
types that can be copied like Buffer. In the latter case the key/value will be copied before putting it in the map.
This way we can ensure there is no shared access to mutable state between different threads in your Vert.x application so you dont
have to worry about protecting that state by synchronising access to it.
Heres an example of using a shared local map:
import io.vertx.groovy.core.buffer.Buffer
def sd = vertx.sharedData()
def map1 = sd.getLocalMap("mymap1")
map1.put("foo", "bar")
def map2 = sd.getLocalMap("mymap2")
map2.put("eek", Buffer.buffer().appendInt(123))
// Then... in another part of your application:
map1 = sd.getLocalMap("mymap1")
def val = map1.get("foo")
map2 = sd.getLocalMap("mymap2")
def buff = map2.get("eek")

Cluster-wide asynchronous maps


Cluster-wide asynchronous maps allow data to be put in the map from any node of the cluster and retrieved from any other node.
This makes them really useful for things like storing session state in a farm of servers hosting a Vert.x web application.
You get an instance of AsyncMapwith getClusterWideMap.
Getting the map is asynchronous and the result is returned to you in the handler that you specify. Heres an example:
def sd = vertx.sharedData()
sd.getClusterWideMap("mymap", { res ->
if (res.succeeded()) {
def map = res.result()
} else {
// Something went wrong!
}
})

Putting data in a map


You put data in a map with put.
The actual put is asynchronous and the handler is notified once it is complete:
map.put("foo", "bar", { resPut ->
if (resPut.succeeded()) {
// Successfully put the value
} else {
// Something went wrong!
}
})

Getting data from a map


You get data from a map with get.
The actual get is asynchronous and the handler is notified with the result some time later
map.get("foo", { resGet ->
if (resGet.succeeded()) {
// Successfully got the value
def val = resGet.result()
} else {
// Something went wrong!
}
})

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Other map operations

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You can also remove entries from an asynchronous map, clear them and get the size.
See the API docsfor more information.

Cluster-wide locks
Cluster wide locksallow

you to obtain exclusive locks across the cluster - this is useful when you want to do something or access a
resource on only one node of a cluster at any one time.
Cluster wide locks have an asynchronous API unlike most lock APIs which block the calling thread until the lock is obtained.
To obtain a lock use getLock.
This wont block, but when the lock is available, the handler will be called with an instance of Lock, signifying that you now own the
lock.
While you own the lock no other caller, anywhere on the cluster will be able to obtain the lock.
When youve finished with the lock, you call releaseto release it, so another caller can obtain it.
sd.getLock("mylock", { res ->
if (res.succeeded()) {
// Got the lock!
def lock = res.result()
// 5 seconds later we release the lock so someone else can get it
vertx.setTimer(5000, { tid ->
lock.release()
})
} else {
// Something went wrong
}
})

You can also get a lock with a timeout. If it fails to obtain the lock within the timeout the handler will be called with a failure:
sd.getLockWithTimeout("mylock", 10000, { res ->
if (res.succeeded()) {
// Got the lock!
def lock = res.result()
} else {
// Failed to get lock
}
})

Cluster-wide counters
Its often useful to maintain an atomic counter across the different nodes of your application.
You can do this with Counter.
You obtain an instance with getCounter:
sd.getCounter("mycounter", { res ->
if (res.succeeded()) {
def counter = res.result()
} else {
// Something went wrong!
}
})

Once you have an instance you can retrieve the current count, atomically increment it, decrement and add a value to it using the various
methods.
See the API docsfor more information.

Using the file system with Vert.x


The Vert.x FileSystemobject provides many operations for manipulating the file system.
There is one file system object per Vert.x instance, and you obtain it with fileSystem.
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A blocking and a non blocking version of each operation is provided. The non blocking versions take a handler which is called when the
operation completes or an error occurs.
Heres an example of an asynchronous copy of a file:
def fs = vertx.fileSystem()
// Copy file from foo.txt to bar.txt
fs.copy("foo.txt", "bar.txt", { res ->
if (res.succeeded()) {
// Copied ok!
} else {
// Something went wrong
}
})

The blocking versions are named xxxBlockingand return the results or throw exceptions directly. In many cases, depending on the
operating system and file system, some of the potentially blocking operations can return quickly, which is why we provide them, but its
highly recommended that you test how long they take to return in your particular application before using them from an event loop, so
as not to break the Golden Rule.
Heres the copy using the blocking API:
def fs = vertx.fileSystem()
// Copy file from foo.txt to bar.txt synchronously
fs.copyBlocking("foo.txt", "bar.txt")

Many operations exist to copy, move, truncate, chmod and many other file operations. We wont list them all here, please consult the
API docsfor the full list.
Lets see a couple of examples using asynchronous methods:
import io.vertx.groovy.core.Vertx
import io.vertx.groovy.core.buffer.Buffer
def vertx = Vertx.vertx()
// Read a file
vertx.fileSystem().readFile("target/classes/readme.txt", { result ->
if (result.succeeded()) {
println(result.result())
} else {
System.err.println("Oh oh ...${result.cause()}")
}
})
// Copy a file
vertx.fileSystem().copy("target/classes/readme.txt", "target/classes/readme2.txt", { result ->
if (result.succeeded()) {
println("File copied")
} else {
System.err.println("Oh oh ...${result.cause()}")
}
})
// Write a file
vertx.fileSystem().writeFile("target/classes/hello.txt", Buffer.buffer("Hello"), { result ->
if (result.succeeded()) {
println("File written")
} else {
System.err.println("Oh oh ...${result.cause()}")
}
})
// Check existence and delete
vertx.fileSystem().exists("target/classes/junk.txt", { result ->
if (result.succeeded() && result.result()) {
vertx.fileSystem().delete("target/classes/junk.txt", { r ->
println("File deleted")
})
} else {
System.err.println("Oh oh ... - cannot delete the file: ${result.cause()}")
}
})

Asynchronous files
Vert.x provides an asynchronous file abstraction that allows you to manipulate a file on the file system.
You open an AsyncFileas follows:
def options = [:]

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fileSystem.open("myfile.txt", options, { res ->
if (res.succeeded()) {
def file = res.result()
} else {
// Something went wrong!
}
})
AsyncFileimplements ReadStreamand WriteStreamso

you can pump files to and from other stream objects such as net sockets, http

requests and responses, and WebSockets.


They also allow you to read and write directly to them.
Random access writes
To use an AsyncFilefor random access writing you use the writemethod.
The parameters to the method are:
buffer: the

buffer to write.

position: an

integer position in the file where to write the buffer. If the position is greater or equal to the size of the file, the file
will be enlarged to accommodate the offset.
handler: the

result handler

Here is an example of random access writes:


import io.vertx.groovy.core.Vertx
import io.vertx.groovy.core.buffer.Buffer
def vertx = Vertx.vertx()
vertx.fileSystem().open("target/classes/hello.txt", [:], { result ->
if (result.succeeded()) {
def file = result.result()
def buff = Buffer.buffer("foo")
for (def i = 0;i < 5;i++) {
file.write(buff, buff.length() * i, { ar ->
if (ar.succeeded()) {
println("Written ok!")
// etc
} else {
System.err.println("Failed to write: ${ar.cause()}")
}
})
}
} else {
System.err.println("Cannot open file ${result.cause()}")
}
})

Random access reads


To use an AsyncFilefor random access reads you use the readmethod.
The parameters to the method are:
buffer: the
offset: an

buffer into which the data will be read.

integer offset into the buffer where the read data will be placed.

position: the
length: the

position in the file where to read data from.

number of bytes of data to read

handler: the

result handler

Heres an example of random access reads:


import io.vertx.groovy.core.Vertx
import io.vertx.groovy.core.buffer.Buffer
def vertx = Vertx.vertx()
vertx.fileSystem().open("target/classes/les_miserables.txt", [:], { result ->
if (result.succeeded()) {
def file = result.result()
def buff = Buffer.buffer(1000)
for (def i = 0;i < 10;i++) {
file.read(buff, i * 100, i * 100, 100, { ar ->
if (ar.succeeded()) {
println("Read ok!")

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} else {
System.err.println("Failed to write: ${ar.cause()}")
}
})

}
} else {
System.err.println("Cannot open file ${result.cause()}")
}
})

Opening Options
When opening an AsyncFile, you pass an OpenOptionsinstance. These options describe the behavior of the file access. For instance,
you can configure the file permissions with the read, writeand permsmethods.
You can also configure the behavior if the open file already exists with createNewand truncateExisting.
You can also mark the file to be deleted on close or when the JVM is shutdown with deleteOnClose.
Flushing data to underlying storage.
In the OpenOptions, you can enable/disable the automatic synchronisation of the content on every write using DSync. In that case, you
can manually flush any writes from the OS cache by calling the flushmethod.
This method can also be called with an handler which will be called when the flush is complete.
Using AsyncFile as ReadStream and WriteStream
AsyncFileimplements ReadStreamand WriteStream. You

can then use them with a pump to pump data to and from other read and
write streams. For example, this would copy the content to another AsyncFile:
import io.vertx.groovy.core.Vertx
import io.vertx.groovy.core.streams.Pump
def vertx = Vertx.vertx()
def output = vertx.fileSystem().openBlocking("target/classes/plagiary.txt", [:])
vertx.fileSystem().open("target/classes/les_miserables.txt", [:], { result ->
if (result.succeeded()) {
def file = result.result()
Pump.pump(file, output).start()
file.endHandler({ r ->
println("Copy done")
})
} else {
System.err.println("Cannot open file ${result.cause()}")
}
})

You can also use the pump to write file content into HTTP responses, or more generally in any WriteStream.
Closing an AsyncFile
To close an AsyncFilecall the closemethod. Closing is asynchronous and if you want to be notified when the close has been
completed you can specify a handler function as an argument.

Datagram sockets (UDP)


Using User Datagram Protocol (UDP) with Vert.x is a piece of cake.
UDP is a connection-less transport which basically means you have no persistent connection to a remote peer.
Instead you can send and receive packages and the remote address is contained in each of them.
Beside this UDP is not as safe as TCP to use, which means there are no guarantees that a send Datagram packet will receive its
endpoint at all.
The only guarantee is that it will either receive complete or not at all.
Also you usually cant send data which is bigger then the MTU size of your network interface, this is because each packet will be send
as one packet.
But be aware even if the packet size is smaller then the MTU it may still fail.
At which size it will fail depends on the Operating System etc. So rule of thumb is to try to send small packets.
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Because of the nature of UDP it is best fit for Applications where you are allowed to drop packets (like for example a monitoring
application).
The benefits are that it has a lot less overhead compared to TCP, which can be handled by the NetServer and NetClient (see above).

Creating a DatagramSocket
To use UDP you first need t create a DatagramSocket. It does not matter here if you only want to send data or send and receive.
def socket = vertx.createDatagramSocket([:])

The returned DatagramSocketwill not be bound to a specific port. This is not a problem if you only want to send data (like a client), but
more on this in the next section.

Sending Datagram packets


As mentioned before, User Datagram Protocol (UDP) sends data in packets to remote peers but is not connected to them in a persistent
fashion.
This means each packet can be sent to a different remote peer.
Sending packets is as easy as shown here:
import io.vertx.groovy.core.buffer.Buffer
def socket = vertx.createDatagramSocket([:])
def buffer = Buffer.buffer("content")
// Send a Buffer
socket.send(buffer, 1234, "10.0.0.1", { asyncResult ->
println("Send succeeded? ${asyncResult.succeeded()}")
})
// Send a String
socket.send("A string used as content", 1234, "10.0.0.1", { asyncResult ->
println("Send succeeded? ${asyncResult.succeeded()}")
})

Receiving Datagram packets


If you want to receive packets you need to bind the DatagramSocketby calling listen()}on it.
This way you will be able to receive DatagramPacket`s that were sent to the address and port on which the
`DatagramSocketlistens.
Beside this you also want to set a Handlerwhich will be called for each received DatagramPacket.
The DatagramPackethas the following methods:
sender: The
data: The

InetSocketAddress which represent the sender of the packet

Buffer which holds the data which was received.

So to listen on a specific address and port you would do something like shown here:
def socket = vertx.createDatagramSocket([:])
socket.listen(1234, "0.0.0.0", { asyncResult ->
if (asyncResult.succeeded()) {
socket.handler({ packet ->
// Do something with the packet
})
} else {
println("Listen failed${asyncResult.cause()}")
}
})

Be aware that even if the {code AsyncResult} is successed it only means it might be written on the network stack, but gives no
guarantee that it ever reached or will reach the remote peer at all.
If you need such a guarantee then you want to use TCP with some handshaking logic build on top.

Multicast
Sending Multicast packets
Multicast allows multiple sockets to receive the same packets. This works by have same join a multicast group to which you can send
packets.

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We will look at how you can joint a Multicast Group and so receive packets in the next section.
For now let us focus on how to send those. Sending multicast packets is not different to send normal Datagram Packets.
The only difference is that you would pass in a multicast group address to the send method.
This is show here:
import io.vertx.groovy.core.buffer.Buffer
def socket = vertx.createDatagramSocket([:])
def buffer = Buffer.buffer("content")
// Send a Buffer to a multicast address
socket.send(buffer, 1234, "230.0.0.1", { asyncResult ->
println("Send succeeded? ${asyncResult.succeeded()}")
})

All sockets that have joined the multicast group 230.0.0.1 will receive the packet.
Receiving Multicast packets

If you want to receive packets for specific Multicast group you need to bind the DatagramSocketby calling listen()on it and join
the Multicast group.
This way you will be able to receive DatagramPackets that were sent to the address and port on which the DatagramSocketlistens and
also to those sent to the Multicast group.
Beside this you also want to set a Handler which will be called for each received DatagramPacket.
The DatagramPackethas the following methods:
sender(): The
data(): The

InetSocketAddress which represent the sender of the packet

Buffer which holds the data which was received.

So to listen on a specific address and port and also receive packets for the Multicast group 230.0.0.1 you would do something like
shown here:
def socket = vertx.createDatagramSocket([:])
socket.listen(1234, "0.0.0.0", { asyncResult ->
if (asyncResult.succeeded()) {
socket.handler({ packet ->
// Do something with the packet
})
// join the multicast group
socket.listenMulticastGroup("230.0.0.1", { asyncResult2 ->
println("Listen succeeded? ${asyncResult2.succeeded()}")
})
} else {
println("Listen failed${asyncResult.cause()}")
}
})

Unlisten / leave a Multicast group

There are sometimes situations where you want to receive packets for a Multicast group for a limited time.
In this situations you can first start to listen for them and then later unlisten.
This is shown here:
def socket = vertx.createDatagramSocket([:])
socket.listen(1234, "0.0.0.0", { asyncResult ->
if (asyncResult.succeeded()) {
socket.handler({ packet ->
// Do something with the packet
})
// join the multicast group
socket.listenMulticastGroup("230.0.0.1", { asyncResult2 ->
if (asyncResult2.succeeded()) {
// will now receive packets for group
// do some work
socket.unlistenMulticastGroup("230.0.0.1", { asyncResult3 ->
println("Unlisten succeeded? ${asyncResult3.succeeded()}")
})
} else {

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println("Listen failed${asyncResult2.cause()}")

}
})
} else {
println("Listen failed${asyncResult.cause()}")
}
})

Blocking multicast

Beside unlisten a Multicast address its also possible to just block multicast for a specific sender address.
Be aware this only work on some Operating Systems and kernel versions. So please check the Operating System documentation if its
supported.
This an expert feature.
To block multicast from a specific address you can call blockMulticastGroup()on the DatagramSocket like shown here:
def socket = vertx.createDatagramSocket([:])
// Some code
// This would block packets which are send from 10.0.0.2
socket.blockMulticastGroup("230.0.0.1", "10.0.0.2", { asyncResult ->
println("block succeeded? ${asyncResult.succeeded()}")
})

DatagramSocket properties
When creating a DatagramSocketthere are multiple properties you can set to change its behaviour with the DatagramSocketOptions
object. Those are listed here:
sendBufferSizeSets

the send buffer size in bytes.

receiveBufferSizeSets
reuseAddressIf

the TCP receive buffer size in bytes.

true then addresses in TIME_WAIT state can be reused after they have been closed.

trafficClass
broadcastSets

or clears the SO_BROADCAST socket option. When this option is set, Datagram (UDP) packets may be sent to a
local interfaces broadcast address.
multicastNetworkInterfaceSets

or clears the IP_MULTICAST_LOOP socket option. When this option is set, multicast
packets will also be received on the local interface.
multicastTimeToLiveSets

the IP_MULTICAST_TTL socket option. TTL stands for "Time to Live," but in this context it
specifies the number of IP hops that a packet is allowed to go through, specifically for multicast traffic. Each router or gateway
that forwards a packet decrements the TTL. If the TTL is decremented to 0 by a router, it will not be forwarded.
DatagramSocket Local Address
You can find out the local address of the socket (i.e. the address of this side of the UDP Socket) by calling localAddress. This will
only return an InetSocketAddressif you bound the DatagramSocketwith listen()before, otherwise it will return null.
Closing a DatagramSocket
You can close a socket by invoking the closemethod. This will close the socket and release all resources

DNS client
Often you will find yourself in situations where you need to obtain DNS informations in an asynchronous fashion.
Unfortunally this is not possible with the API that is shipped with the Java Virtual Machine itself. Because of this Vert.x offers its own
API for DNS resolution which is fully asynchronous.
To obtain a DnsClient instance you will create a new via the Vertx instance.
def client = vertx.createDnsClient(53, "10.0.0.1")

Be aware that you can pass in a varargs of InetSocketAddress arguments to specifiy more then one DNS Server to try to query for DNS
resolution. The DNS Servers will be queried in the same order as specified here. Where the next will be used once the first produce an
error while be used.
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lookup
Try to lookup the A (ipv4) or AAAA (ipv6) record for a given name. The first which is returned will be used, so it behaves the same
way as you may be used from when using "nslookup" on your operation system.
To lookup the A / AAAA record for "vertx.io" you would typically use it like:
def client = vertx.createDnsClient(53, "10.0.0.1")
client.lookup("vertx.io", { ar ->
if (ar.succeeded()) {
println(ar.result())
} else {
println("Failed to resolve entry${ar.cause()}")
}
})

lookup4
Try to lookup the A (ipv4) record for a given name. The first which is returned will be used, so it behaves the same way as you may be
used from when using "nslookup" on your operation system.
To lookup the A record for "vertx.io" you would typically use it like:
def client = vertx.createDnsClient(53, "10.0.0.1")
client.lookup4("vertx.io", { ar ->
if (ar.succeeded()) {
println(ar.result())
} else {
println("Failed to resolve entry${ar.cause()}")
}
})

lookup6
Try to lookup the AAAA (ipv6) record for a given name. The first which is returned will be used, so it behaves the same way as you
may be used from when using "nslookup" on your operation system.
To lookup the A record for "vertx.io" you would typically use it like:
def client = vertx.createDnsClient(53, "10.0.0.1")
client.lookup6("vertx.io", { ar ->
if (ar.succeeded()) {
println(ar.result())
} else {
println("Failed to resolve entry${ar.cause()}")
}
})

resolveA
Try to resolve all A (ipv4) records for a given name. This is quite similar to using "dig" on unix like operation systems.
To lookup all the A records for "vertx.io" you would typically do:
def client = vertx.createDnsClient(53, "10.0.0.1")
client.resolveA("vertx.io", { ar ->
if (ar.succeeded()) {
def records = ar.result()
records.each { record ->
println(record)
}
} else {
println("Failed to resolve entry${ar.cause()}")
}
})

resolveAAAA
Try to resolve all AAAA (ipv6) records for a given name. This is quite similar to using "dig" on unix like operation systems.
To lookup all the AAAAA records for "vertx.io" you would typically do:
def client = vertx.createDnsClient(53, "10.0.0.1")
client.resolveAAAA("vertx.io", { ar ->
if (ar.succeeded()) {
def records = ar.result()
records.each { record ->
println(record)

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}
} else {
println("Failed to resolve entry${ar.cause()}")
}
})

resolveCNAME
Try to resolve all CNAME records for a given name. This is quite similar to using "dig" on unix like operation systems.
To lookup all the CNAME records for "vertx.io" you would typically do:
def client = vertx.createDnsClient(53, "10.0.0.1")
client.resolveCNAME("vertx.io", { ar ->
if (ar.succeeded()) {
def records = ar.result()
records.each { record ->
println(record)
}
} else {
println("Failed to resolve entry${ar.cause()}")
}
})

resolveMX
Try to resolve all MX records for a given name. The MX records are used to define which Mail-Server accepts emails for a given
domain.
To lookup all the MX records for "vertx.io" you would typically do:
def client = vertx.createDnsClient(53, "10.0.0.1")
client.resolveMX("vertx.io", { ar ->
if (ar.succeeded()) {
def records = ar.result()
records.each { record ->
println(record)
}
} else {
println("Failed to resolve entry${ar.cause()}")
}
})

Be aware that the List will contain the MxRecordsorted by the priority of them, which means MX records with smaller priority coming
first in the List.
The MxRecordallows you to access the priority and the name of the MX record by offer methods for it like:
record.priority()
record.name()

resolveTXT
Try to resolve all TXT records for a given name. TXT records are often used to define extra informations for a domain.
To resolve all the TXT records for "vertx.io" you could use something along these lines:
def client = vertx.createDnsClient(53, "10.0.0.1")
client.resolveTXT("vertx.io", { ar ->
if (ar.succeeded()) {
def records = ar.result()
records.each { record ->
println(record)
}
} else {
println("Failed to resolve entry${ar.cause()}")
}
})

resolveNS
Try to resolve all NS records for a given name. The NS records specify which DNS Server hosts the DNS informations for a given
domain.
To resolve all the NS records for "vertx.io" you could use something along these lines:
def client = vertx.createDnsClient(53, "10.0.0.1")
client.resolveNS("vertx.io", { ar ->
if (ar.succeeded()) {

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def records = ar.result()
records.each { record ->
println(record)
}
} else {
println("Failed to resolve entry${ar.cause()}")
}
})

resolveSRV
Try to resolve all SRV records for a given name. The SRV records are used to define extra informations like port and hostname of
services. Some protocols need this extra informations.
To lookup all the SRV records for "vertx.io" you would typically do:
def client = vertx.createDnsClient(53, "10.0.0.1")
client.resolveSRV("vertx.io", { ar ->
if (ar.succeeded()) {
def records = ar.result()
records.each { record ->
println(record)
}
} else {
println("Failed to resolve entry${ar.cause()}")
}
})

Be aware that the List will contain the SrvRecords sorted by the priority of them, which means SrvRecords with smaller priority coming
first in the List.
The SrvRecordallows you to access all informations contained in the SRV record itself:
record.priority()
record.name()
record.weight()
record.port()
record.protocol()
record.service()
record.target()

Please refer to the API docs for the exact details.

resolvePTR
Try to resolve the PTR record for a given name. The PTR record maps an ipaddress to a name.
To resolve the PTR record for the ipaddress 10.0.0.1 you would use the PTR notion of "1.0.0.10.in-addr.arpa"
def client = vertx.createDnsClient(53, "10.0.0.1")
client.resolvePTR("1.0.0.10.in-addr.arpa", { ar ->
if (ar.succeeded()) {
def record = ar.result()
println(record)
} else {
println("Failed to resolve entry${ar.cause()}")
}
})

reverseLookup
Try to do a reverse lookup for an ipaddress. This is basically the same as resolve a PTR record, but allows you to just pass in the
ipaddress and not a valid PTR query string.
To do a reverse lookup for the ipaddress 10.0.0.1 do something similar like this:
def client = vertx.createDnsClient(53, "10.0.0.1")
client.reverseLookup("10.0.0.1", { ar ->
if (ar.succeeded()) {
def record = ar.result()
println(record)
} else {
println("Failed to resolve entry${ar.cause()}")
}
})

Error handling
As you saw in previous sections the DnsClient allows you to pass in a Handler which will be notified with an AsyncResult once the
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query was complete.


In case of an error it will be notified with a DnsException which will hole a DnsResponseCodethat indicate why the resolution failed.
This DnsResponseCode can be used to inspect the cause in more detail.
Possible DnsResponseCodes are:
NOERRORNo

record was found for a given query

FORMERRORFormat

error

SERVFAILServer

failure

NXDOMAINName

error

NOTIMPLNot

implemented by DNS Server

REFUSEDDNS

Server refused the query

YXDOMAINDomain

name should not exist

YXRRSETResource

record should not exist

NXRRSETRRSET
NOTZONEName
BADVERSBad

does not exist

not in zone

extension mechanism for version

BADSIGBad

signature

BADKEYBad

key

BADTIMEBad

timestamp

All of those errors are "generated" by the DNS Server itself.


You can obtain the DnsResponseCodefrom the DnsExceptionlike:
def client = vertx.createDnsClient(53, "8.8.8.8");
client.lookup("missing.vertx.io", { ar ->
if (ar.succeeded()) {
def record = ar.result();
println "record: " + record;
} else {
def cause = ar.cause();
if (cause instanceof DnsException) {
def code = cause.code();
println "Code : " + code
// ...
} else {
println("Failed to resolve entry" + ar.cause());
}
}
})

Streams
There are several objects in Vert.x that allow items to be read from and written.
In previous versions the streams.adoc package was manipulating Bufferobjects exclusively. From now, streams are not anymore
coupled to buffers and work with any kind of objects.
In Vert.x, calls to write item return immediately and writes are internally queued.
Its not hard to see that if you write to an object faster than it can actually write the data to its underlying resource then the write queue
could grow without bound - eventually resulting in exhausting available memory.
To solve this problem a simple flow control capability is provided by some objects in the Vert.x API.
Any flow control aware object that can be written-to implements ReadStream, and any flow control object that can be read-from is said
to implement WriteStream.
Lets take an example where we want to read from a ReadStreamand write the data to a WriteStream.
A very simple example would be reading from a NetSocketon a server and writing back to the same NetSocket- since NetSocket
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implements both ReadStreamand WriteStream, but you can do this between any ReadStreamand any WriteStream, including HTTP
requests and response, async files, WebSockets, etc.
A naive way to do this would be to directly take the data thats been read and immediately write it to the NetSocket, for example:
def server = vertx.createNetServer([
port:1234,
host:"localhost"
])
server.connectHandler({ sock ->
sock.handler({ buffer ->
// Write the data straight back
sock.write(buffer)
})
}).listen()

Theres a problem with the above example: If data is read from the socket faster than it can be written back to the socket, it will build up
in the write queue of the NetSocket, eventually running out of RAM. This might happen, for example if the client at the other end of the
socket wasnt reading very fast, effectively putting back-pressure on the connection.
Since NetSocketimplements WriteStream, we can check if the WriteStreamis full before writing to it:
def server = vertx.createNetServer([
port:1234,
host:"localhost"
])
server.connectHandler({ sock ->
sock.handler({ buffer ->
if (!sock.writeQueueFull()) {
sock.write(buffer)
}
})
}).listen()

This example wont run out of RAM but well end up losing data if the write queue gets full. What we really want to do is pause the
NetSocketwhen the write queue is full. Lets do that:
def server = vertx.createNetServer([
port:1234,
host:"localhost"
])
server.connectHandler({ sock ->
sock.handler({ buffer ->
sock.write(buffer)
if (sock.writeQueueFull()) {
sock.pause()
}
})
}).listen()

Were almost there, but not quite. The NetSocketnow gets paused when the file is full, but we also need to unpause it when the write
queue has processed its backlog:
def server = vertx.createNetServer([
port:1234,
host:"localhost"
])
server.connectHandler({ sock ->
sock.handler({ buffer ->
sock.write(buffer)
if (sock.writeQueueFull()) {
sock.pause()
sock.drainHandler({ done ->
sock.resume()
})
}
})
}).listen()

And there we have it. The drainHandlerevent handler will get called when the write queue is ready to accept more data, this resumes
the NetSocketwhich allows it to read more data.
Its very common to want to do this when writing Vert.x applications, so we provide a helper class called Pumpwhich does all this hard
work for you. You just feed it the ReadStreamand the WriteStreamand it tell it to start:
import io.vertx.groovy.core.streams.Pump
def server = vertx.createNetServer([
port:1234,
host:"localhost"
])
server.connectHandler({ sock ->

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}).listen()

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Which does exactly the same thing as the more verbose example.
Lets look at the methods on ReadStreamand WriteStreamin more detail:

ReadStream
ReadStreamis implemented by HttpClientResponse, DatagramSocket, HttpClientRequest, HttpServerFileUpload,
HttpServerRequest, HttpServerRequestStream, MessageConsumer, NetSocket, NetSocketStream, WebSocket, WebSocketStream,
TimeoutStream, AsyncFile.

Functions:
handler: set

a handler which will receive items from the ReadStream.

pause: pause

the handler. When paused no items will be received in the handler.

resume: resume

the handler. The handler will be called if any item arrives.

exceptionHandler: Will

be called if an exception occurs on the ReadStream.

endHandler: Will

be called when end of stream is reached. This might be when EOF is reached if the ReadStream represents a
file, or when end of request is reached if its an HTTP request, or when the connection is closed if its a TCP socket.

WriteStream
WriteStreamis implemented
and MessageProducer

by HttpClientRequest, HttpServerResponseWebSocket, NetSocket, AsyncFile, PacketWritestream

Functions:
write: write

an object to the WriteStream. This method will never block. Writes are queued internally and asynchronously
written to the underlying resource.
setWriteQueueMaxSize: set the number of object at which the write queue is considered full, and the method writeQueueFull
returns true. Note that, when the write queue is considered full, if write is called the data will still be accepted and queued. The
actual number depends on the stream implementation, for Bufferthe size represents the actual number of bytes written and not

the number of buffers.


writeQueueFull: returns trueif
exceptionHandler: Will
drainHandler: The

the write queue is considered full.

be called if an exception occurs on the WriteStream.

handler will be called if the WriteStreamis considered no longer full.

Pump
Instances of Pump have the following methods:
start: Start

the pump.

stop: Stops

the pump. When the pump starts it is in stopped mode.

setWriteQueueMaxSize: This

has the same meaning as setWriteQueueMaxSizeon the WriteStream.

A pump can be started and stopped multiple times.


When a pump is first created it is not started. You need to call the start()method to start it.

Record Parser
The record parser allows you to easily parse protocols which are delimited by a sequence of bytes, or fixed size records.
It transforms an sequence of input buffer to a sequence of buffer structured as configured (either fixed size or separated records).
For example, if you have a simple ASCII text protocol delimited by '\n' and the input is the following:
buffer1:HELLO\nHOW ARE Y
buffer2:OU?\nI AM
buffer3: DOING OK
buffer4:\n

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The record parser would produce


buffer1:HELLO
buffer2:HOW ARE YOU?
buffer3:I AM DOING OK

Lets see the associated code:


import io.vertx.groovy.core.parsetools.RecordParser
import io.vertx.groovy.core.buffer.Buffer
def parser = RecordParser.newDelimited("\n", { h ->
println(h.toString())
})
parser.handle(Buffer.buffer("HELLO\nHOW ARE Y"))
parser.handle(Buffer.buffer("OU?\nI AM"))
parser.handle(Buffer.buffer("DOING OK"))
parser.handle(Buffer.buffer("\n"))

You can also produce fixed sized chunks as follows:


import io.vertx.groovy.core.parsetools.RecordParser
RecordParser.newFixed(4, { h ->
println(h.toString())
})

For more details, check out the RecordParserclass.

Thread safety
Most Vert.x objects are safe to access from different threads. However performance is optimised when they are accessed from the same
context they were created from.
For example if you have deployed a verticle which creates a NetServerwhich provides NetSocketinstances in its handler, then its
best to always access that socket instance from the event loop of the verticle.
If you stick to the standard Vert.x verticle deployment model and avoid sharing objects between verticles then this should be the case
without you having to think about it.

Metrics SPI
By default Vert.x does not record any metrics. Instead it provides an SPI for others to implement which can be added to the classpath.
The metrics SPI is an advanced feature which allows implementers to capture events from Vert.x in order to gather metrics. For more
information on this, please consult the API Documentation.

OSGi
Vert.x Core is packaged as an OSGi bundle, so can be used in any OSGi R4.2+ environment such as Apache Felix or Eclipse Equinox.
The bundle exports io.vertx.core*.
However, the bundle has some dependencies on Jackson and Netty. To get the vert.x core bundle resolved deploy:
Jackson Annotation [2.5.0,3)
Jackson Core [2.5.0,3)
Jackson Databind [2.5.0,3)
Netty Buffer [4.0.27,5)
Netty Codec [4.0.27,5)
Netty Codec/Socks [4.0.27,5)
Netty Codec/Common [4.0.27,5)
Netty Codec/Handler [4.0.27,5)
Netty Codec/Transport [4.0.27,5)
Here is a working deployment on Apache Felix 4.6.1:
14|Active
15|Active
16|Active

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1|Jackson-annotations (2.5.3)
1|Jackson-core (2.5.3)
1|jackson-databind (2.5.3)

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18|Active
19|Active
20|Active
21|Active
22|Active
23|Active
25|Active

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1|Netty/Buffer (4.0.27.Final)
1|Netty/Codec (4.0.27.Final)
1|Netty/Codec/HTTP (4.0.27.Final)
1|Netty/Codec/Socks (4.0.27.Final)
1|Netty/Common (4.0.27.Final)
1|Netty/Handler (4.0.27.Final)
1|Netty/Transport (4.0.27.Final)
1|Vert.x Core (3.0.0.SNAPSHOT)

The 'vertx' command line


The vertxcommand is used to interact with Vert.x from the command line. Its main use is to run Vert.x verticles. To do this you need
to download and install a Vert.x distribution, and add the bindirectory of the installation to your PATHenvironment variable. Also make
sure you have a Java 8 JDK on your PATH.
Note The JDK is required to support on the fly compilation of Java code.

Run verticles
You can run raw Vert.x verticles directly from the command line using vertx run. Here is a couple of examples:
vertx run my-verticle.js
vertx run my-verticle.groovy
vertx run my-verticle.rb

(1)
(2)
(3)

vertx run io.vertx.example.MyVerticle


(4)
vertx run io.vertx.example.MVerticle -cp my-verticle.jar (5)
vertx run MyVerticle.java

(6)

1. Deploys a JavaScript verticle


2. Deploys a Groovy verticle
3. Deploys a Ruby verticle
4. Deploys an already compiled Java verticle. Classpath root is the current directory
5. Deploys a verticle packaged in a Jar, the jar need to be in the classpath
6. Compiles the Java source and deploys it
As you can see in the case of Java, the name can either be the fully qualified class name of the verticle, or you can specify the Java
Source file directly and Vert.x compiles it for you.
You can also prefix the verticle with the name of the language implementation to use. For example if the verticle is a compiled Groovy
class, you prefix it with groovy:so that Vert.x knows its a Groovy class not a Java class.
vertx run groovy:io.vertx.example.MyGroovyVerticle

The vertx runcommand can take a few optional parameters, they are:
-conf <config_file>-

Provides some configuration to the verticle. config_fileis the name of a text file containing a JSON
object that represents the configuration for the verticle. This is optional.
-cp <path>-

The path on which to search for the verticle and any other resources used by the verticle. This defaults to .(current
directory). If your verticle references other scripts, classes or other resources (e.g. jar files) then make sure these are on this path.
The path can contain multiple path entries separated by :(colon) or ;(semi-colon) depending on the operating system. Each path
entry can be an absolute or relative path to a directory containing scripts, or absolute or relative filenames for jar or zip files. An
example path might be -cp classes:lib/otherscripts:jars/myjar.jar:jars/otherjar.jar. Always use the path to
reference any resources that your verticle requires. Do not put them on the system classpath as this can cause isolation issues
between deployed verticles.
-instances <instances>-

The number of instances of the verticle to instantiate. Each verticle instance is strictly single threaded
so to scale your application across available cores you might want to deploy more than one instance. If omitted a single instance
will be deployed.
-worker-

This option determines whether the verticle is a worker verticle or not.

-cluster-

This option determines whether the Vert.x instance will attempt to form a cluster with other Vert.x instances on the
network. Clustering Vert.x instances allows Vert.x to form a distributed event bus with other nodes. Default is false(not
clustered).
-cluster-port-

If the cluster option has also been specified then this determines which port will be used for cluster
communication with other Vert.x instances. Default is 0- which means 'choose a free random port'. You dont usually need to
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specify this parameter unless you really need to bind to a specific port.
-cluster-host-

If the cluster option has also been specified then this determines which host address will be used for cluster
communication with other Vert.x instances. By default it will try and pick one from the available interfaces. If you have more
than one interface and you want to use a specific one, specify it here.
-ha-

if specified the verticle will be deployed as high availability (HA) deployment. See related section for more details

-quorum-

used in conjunction with -ha. It specifies the minimum number of nodes in the cluster for any HA deploymentIDs to be
active. Defaults to 0.
-hagroup-

used in conjunction with -ha. It specifies the HA group this node will join. There can be multiple HA groups in a
cluster. Nodes will only failover to other nodes in the same group. The default value is ` __DEFAULT__`
Here are some more examples:
Run a JavaScript verticle server.js with default settings
vertx run server.js

Run 10 instances of a pre-compiled Java verticle specifying classpath


vertx run com.acme.MyVerticle -cp "classes:lib/myjar.jar" -instances 10

Run 10 instances of a Java verticle by source file


vertx run MyVerticle.java -instances 10

Run 20 instances of a ruby worker verticle


vertx run order_worker.rb -instances 20 -worker

Run two JavaScript verticles on the same machine and let them cluster together with each other and any other servers on the network
vertx run handler.js -cluster
vertx run sender.js -cluster

Run a Ruby verticle passing it some config


vertx run my_verticle.rb -conf my_verticle.conf

Where my_verticle.confmight contain something like:


{
"name": "foo",
"num_widgets": 46
}

The config will be available inside the verticle via the core API.
When using the high-availability feature of vert.x you may want to create a bare instance of vert.x. This instance does not deploy any
verticles when launched, but will receive a verticle if another node of the cluster dies. To create a bare instance, launch:
vertx -ha

Depending on your cluster configuration, you may have to append the cluster-hostand cluster-portparameters.

Executing verticles packaged as a fat jar


A fat jar is an executable jar embedding its dependencies. This means you dont have to have Vert.x pre-installed on the machine on
which you execute the jar. A verticle packaged as a fat jar can just be launched using:
java -jar my-verticle-fat.jar

The fat jar must have a manifest with:


Main-Classset

to io.vertx.core.Starter

Main-Verticlespecifying

the main verticle (fully qualified name)

You can also provide the usual command line arguments that you would pass to vertx run:
java -jar my-verticle-fat.jar -cluster -conf myconf.json
java -jar my-verticle-fat.jar -cluster -conf myconf.json -cp path/to/dir/conf/cluster_xml

Note fat jar can be built using Gradle build or the Maven plugin. Check the vertx examples for instructions.

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Displaying version of Vert.x


To display the vert.x version, just launch:
vertx -version

Cluster Managers
In Vert.x a cluster manager is used for various functions including:
Discovery and group membership of Vert.x nodes in a cluster
Maintaining cluster wide topic subscriber lists (so we know which nodes are interested in which event bus addresses)
Distributed Map support
Distributed Locks
Distributed Counters
Cluster managers do not handle the event bus inter-node transport, this is done directly by Vert.x with TCP connections.
The default cluster manager used in the Vert.x distributions is one that uses Hazelcast but this can be easily replaced by a different
implementation as Vert.x cluster managers are pluggable.
A cluster manager must implement the interface ClusterManager. Vert.x locates cluster managers at run-time by using the Java Service
Loader functionality to locate instances of ClusterManageron the classpath.
If you are using Vert.x at the command line and you want to use clustering you should make sure the libdirectory of the Vert.x
installation contains your cluster manager jar.
If you are using Vert.x from a Maven or Gradle project just add the cluster manager jar as a dependency of your project.
You can also specify cluster managers programmatically if embedding Vert.x using clusterManager.

Logging
Vert.x logs using its in-built logging API. The default implementation uses the JDK (JUL) logging so no extra logging dependencies
are needed.

Configuring JUL logging


A JUL logging configuration file can be specified in the normal JUL way by providing a system property called:
java.util.logging.config.filewith the value being your configuration file. For more information on this and the structure of a JUL
config file please consult the JUL logging documentation.
Vert.x also provides a slightly more convenient way to specify a configuration file without having to set a system property. Just provide
a JUL config file with the name vertx-default-jul-logging.propertieson your classpath (e.g. inside your fatjar) and Vert.x will
use that to configure JUL.

Using another logging framework


If you dont want Vert.x to use JUL for its own logging you can configure it to use another logging framework, e.g. Log4J or SLF4J.
To do this you should set a system property called vertx.logger-delegate-factory-class-namewith the name of a Java class which
implements the interface LoggerFactory. We provide pre-built implementations for Log4J and SLF4J with the class names
io.vertx.core.logging.Log4jLogDelegateFactoryand io.vertx.core.logging.SLF4JLogDelegateFactoryrespectively. If you
want to use these implementations you should also make sure the relevant Log4J or SLF4J jars are on your classpath.

Logging from your application


Vert.x itself is just a library and you can use whatever logging library you prefer to log from your own application, using that logging
librarys API.
However, if you prefer you can use the Vert.x logging facility as described above to provide logging for your application too.
To do that you use LoggerFactoryto get an instance of Loggerwhich you then use for logging, e.g.
// Note -these classes are Java only
// You would normally maintain one static instance of Logger per Java class:

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def logger = io.vertx.core.logging.LoggerFactory.getLogger(className)
logger.info("something happened")
logger.error("oops!", exception)

High Availability and Fail-Over


Vert.x allows you to run your verticles with high availability (HA) support. In that case, when a vert.x instance running a verticle dies
abruptly, the verticle is migrated to another vertx instance. The vert.x instances must be in the same cluster.

Automatic failover
When vert.x runs with HA enabled, if a vert.x instance where a verticle runs fails or dies, the verticle is redeployed automatically on
another vert.x instance of the cluster. We call this verticle fail-over.
To run vert.x with the HA enabled, just add the -haflag to the command line:
vertx run my-verticle.js -ha

Now for HA to work, you need more than one Vert.x instances in the cluster, so lets say you have another Vert.x instance that you have
already started, for example:
vertx run my-other-verticle.js -ha

If the Vert.x instance that is running my-verticle.jsnow dies (you can test this by killing the process with kill -9), the Vert.x
instance that is running my-other-verticle.jswill automatic deploy my-verticle .jsso now that Vert.x instance is running both
verticles.
Note the migration is only possible if the second vert.x instance has access to the verticle file (here my-verticle.js).
Important Please note that cleanly closing a Vert.x instance will not cause failover to occur, e.g. CTRL-Cor kill -SIGINT
You can also start bare Vert.x instances - i.e. instances that are not initially running any verticles, they will also failover for nodes in the
cluster. To start a bare instance you simply do:
vertx run -ha

When using the -haswitch you do not need to provide the -clusterswitch, as a cluster is assumed if you want HA.
Note

depending on your cluster configuration, you may need to customize the cluster manager configuration (Hazelcast by default),
and/or add the cluster-hostand cluster-portparameters.

HA groups
When running a Vert.x instance with HA you can also optional specify a HA group. A HA group denotes a logical group of nodes in the
cluster. Only nodes with the same HA group will failover onto one another. If you dont specify a HA group the default group
__DEFAULT__is used.
To specify an HA group you use the -hagroupswitch when running the verticle, e.g.
vertx run my-verticle.js -ha -ha-group my-group

Lets look at an example:


In a first terminal:
vertx run my-verticle.js -ha -hagroup g1

In a second terminal, lets run another verticle using the same group:
vertx run my-other-verticle.js -ha -hagroup g1

Finally, in a third terminal, launch another verticle using a different group:


vertx run yet-another-verticle.js -ha -hagroup g2

If we kill the instance in terminal 1, it will fail over to the instance in terminal 2, not the instance in terminal 3 as that has a different
group.
If we kill the instance in terminal 3, it wont get failed over as there is no other vert.x instance in that group.

Dealing with network partitions - Quora


The HA implementation also supports quora. A quorum is the minimum number of votes that a distributed transaction has to obtain in
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order to be allowed to perform an operation in a distributed system.


When starting a Vert.x instance you can instruct it that it requires a quorumbefore any HA deployments will be deployed. In this
context, a quorum is a minimum number of nodes for a particular group in the cluster. Typically you chose your quorum size to Q = 1
+ N/2where Nis the number of nodes in the group. If there are less than Qnodes in the cluster the HA deployments will undeploy. They
will redeploy again if/when a quorum is re-attained. By doing this you can prevent against network partitions, a.k.a. split brain.
There is more information on quora here.
To run vert.x instances with a quorum you specify -quorumon the command line, e.g.
In a first terminal:
vertx run my-verticle.js -ha -quorum 3

At this point the Vert.x instance will start but not deploy the module (yet) because there is only one node in the cluster, not 3.
In a second terminal:
vertx run my-other-verticle.js -ha -quorum 3

At this point the Vert.x instance will start but not deploy the module (yet) because there are only two nodes in the cluster, not 3.
In a third console, you can start another instance of vert.x:
vertx run yet-another-verticle.js -ha -quorum 3

Yay! - we have three nodes, thats a quorum. At this point the modules will automatically deploy on all instances.
If we now close or kill one of the nodes the modules will automatically undeploy on the other nodes, as there is no longer a quorum.
Quora can also be used in conjunction with ha groups. In that case, quora are resolved for each particular group.

Security notes
Vert.x is a toolkit, not an opinionated framework where we force you to do things in a certain way. This gives you great power as a
developer but with that comes great responsibility.
As with any toolkit, its possible to write insecure applications, so you should always be careful when developing your application
especially if its exposed to the public (e.g. over the internet).

Web applications
If writing a web application its highly recommended that you use Vert.x-Web instead of Vert.x core directly for serving resources and
handling file uploads.
Vert.x-Web normalises the path in requests to prevent malicious clients from crafting URLs to access resources outside of the web root.
Similarly for file uploads Vert.x-Web provides functionality for uploading to a known place on disk and does not rely on the filename
provided by the client in the upload which could be crafted to upload to a different place on disk.
Vert.x core itself does not provide such checks so it would be up to you as a developer to implement them yourself.

Clustered event bus traffic


When clustering the event bus between different Vert.x nodes on a network, the traffic is sent un-encrypted across the wire, so do not
use this if you have confidential data to send and your Vert.x nodes are not on a trusted network.

Standard security best practices


Any service can have potentially vulnerabilities whether its written using Vert.x or any other toolkit so always follow security best
practice, especially if your service is public facing.
For example you should always run them in a DMZ and with an user account that has limited rights in order to limit the extent of
damage in case the service was compromised.
Last updated 2015-06-26 13:50:28 CEST

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Documentation
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Vert.x 2

Community
Help & Contributors
User Group
Developer Group
Vert.x is open source and dual licensed under the Eclipse Public License 1.0 and Apache License 2.0.
This website is licensed under the CC BY-SA 3.0 License.
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