[collectd] perl plugin multithreading issue

[Sebastian Harl]

Hi,

The current version (in fact any versions so far) of the perl plugin does not
work correctly if collectd uses multiple threads - it will crash with a
segfault at some point. collectd might access the perl interpreter multiple
times simultaneously (read, write and log plugins) which Perl is not able to
handle without some magic.

I'm currently looking for a solution for that but there is basically no
documentation besides source code and people keep telling me that support for
that kind of stuff is really bad (it might even be non-existing) in Perl.
Anyway, I'm quite sure I will find some kind of solution - I just don't want
it to be some bad hack, so it will probably take some time (I will have to
fight some zombies lurking in dark alleys along the way to be able to enter
the twilight zone that awaits me after crossing the C boundry trying to
understand the underlying magic of Perl's internals).

For now the perl plugin will continue to be marked as experimental. It should
work fine though if you use a single read thread only (see the "ReadThreads"
configuration option). This should be a reasonable workaround - at least for
testing purposes.

Cheers,
Sebastian

-- 
Sebastian "tokkee" Harl +++ GnuPG-ID: 0x8501C7FC +++ http://tokkee.org/

Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary
Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.         -- Benjamin Franklin

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