Async invoke with a callback

Overview

Services invoked asynchronously run in background without blocking the service initiating the call.

Upon executing self.invoke_async, the calling service receives a Correlation ID that will be passed in to the target service being executed asynchronously as the latter's self.cid so that requests can be correlated with responses.

Additionally, the source service can provide the name of a service that will serve as a callback sink consuming responses from the target service after it completes.

Usage examples and API

Async invoke with no callback

Invoke self.invoke_async so the target service is run in background. A Correlation ID is returned on output - the target service can access it via self.cid.

from zato.server.service import Service

class MyService(Service):

    def handle(self):
        cid = self.invoke_async('zato.helpers.input-logger', 'Hello from async!')
        self.logger.info('I received a CID %r', cid)

Async invoke - explicit callback

Invoke the target providing the name of a callback to execute once the target completes. Any response produced by the target is available, as string, under self.request.payload in the callback.

from zato.server.service import Service

class MyService(Service):

    def handle(self):
        self.invoke_async('zato.ping', 'Hello from async!', callback='my.callback')

class MyCallback(Service):
    name = 'my.callback'

    def handle(self):
        self.logger.info('I received %r', self.request.payload)

Async invoke - callback by convention

By convention, if there is a service whose name is the name of the invoking service plus -async-callback, that service will be used as the callback sink.

For instance, if a Python module contains a service with the name equal to that of the invoking service followed by AsyncCallback, such as MyService and MyServiceAsyncCallback below, that service will be considered a callback for all asynchronous invocations - here, all async replies to calls from MyService will be delivered to MyServiceAsyncCallback.

from zato.server.service import Service

class MyService(Service):

    def handle(self):
        self.invoke_async('zato.ping', 'Hello from async!')

class MyServiceAsyncCallback(Service):

    def handle(self):
        self.logger.info('I also received %r', self.request.payload)