9. Server Protocol¶
A Futhark program can be compiled to a server executable. Such a server maintains a Futhark context and presents a line-oriented interface (over stdin/stdout) for loading and dumping values, as well as calling the entry points in the program. The main advantage over the plain executable interface is that program initialisation is done only once, and we can work with opaque values.
The server interface is not intended for human consumption, but is useful for writing tools on top of Futhark programs, without having to use the C API. Futhark’s built-in benchmarking and testing tools use server executables.
A server executable is started like any other executable, and supports most of the same command line options (Executable Options).
9.1. Basics¶
Each command is sent as a single line on standard input. A command
consists of space-separated words. A word is either a sequence of
non-space characters (foo
), or double quotes surrounding a
sequence of non-newline and non-quote characters ("foo bar"
).
The response is sent on standard output. The server will print %%%
OK
on a line by itself to indicate that a command has finished. It
will also print %%% OK
at startup once initialisation has
finished. If initialisation fails, the process will terminate. If a
command fails, the server will print %%% FAILURE
followed by the
error message, and then %%% OK
when it is ready for more input.
Some output may also precede %%% FAILURE
, e.g. logging statements
that occured before failure was detected. Fatal errors that lead to
server shutdown may be printed to stderr.
9.2. Variables¶
Some commands produce or read variables. A variable is a mapping from a name to a Futhark value. Values can be both transparent (arrays and primitives), but they can also be opaque values. These can be produced by entry points and passed to other entry points, but cannot be directly inspected.
9.3. Types¶
All variables have types, and all entry points accept inputs and
produce outputs of defined types. The notion of transparent and
opaque types are the same as in the C API: primitives and array of
primitives are directly supported, and everything else is treated as
opaque. See also Value Mapping. When printed, types follow
basic Futhark type syntax without sizes (e.g. [][]i32
).
Uniqueness is not part of the types, but is indicated with an asterisk
in the inputs
and outputs
commands (see below).
9.4. Consumption and aliasing¶
Since the server protocol closely models the C API, the same rules
apply to entry points that consume their arguments (see
Consumption and Aliasing). In particular, consumed variables must still
be freed with the free
command - but this is the only operation
that may be used on consumed variables.
9.5. Commands¶
The following commands are supported.
9.5.1. call
entry o1 … oN i1 … iM¶
Call the given entry point with input from the variables i1 to iM. The results are stored in o1 to oN, which must not already exist.
9.5.2. restore
file v1 t1 … vN tN¶
Load N values from file and store them in the variables v1 to vN of types t1 to tN, which must not already exist.
9.5.3. store
file v1 … vN¶
Store the N values in variables v1 to vN in file.
9.5.4. free
v1 … vN¶
Delete the given variables.
9.5.5. rename
oldname newname¶
Rename the variable oldname to newname, which must not already exist.
9.5.6. inputs
entry¶
Print the types of inputs accepted by the given entry point, one per line. If the given input is consumed, the type is prefixed by *.
9.5.7. outputs
entry¶
Print the types of outputs produced by the given entry point, one per line. If the given output is guaranteed to be unique (does not alias any inputs), the type is prefixed by *.
9.5.8. clear
¶
Clear all internal caches and counters maintained by the Futhark
context. Corresponds to futhark_context_clear_caches()
.
9.5.9. pause_profiling
¶
Corresponds to futhark_context_pause_profiling()
.
9.5.10. unpause_profiling
¶
Corresponds to futhark_context_unpause_profiling()
.
9.5.11. report
¶
Corresponds to futhark_context_report()
.
9.5.12. set_tuning_param
¶
Corresponds to futhark_context_config_set_tuning_param()
.
9.6. Environment Variables¶
9.6.1. FUTHARK_COMPILER_DEBUGGING
¶
Turns on debugging output for the server when set to 1.