actors

It provides an actor system.

The project frtex uses this actor system for reading a LaTeX file and return a new LaTeX file in which the "\input" are (recursively) replaced by the content.

Installation and test

• download the actor system from github
• Use it by example performing the tests :

mvn  test

General classes

• Message
• Mail
• MailBox

An abstract implementation : the Decent actor system.

The types are

• DecentActorSystem its special features are :

  • void setUpActor(DecentActorRef,DecentActor). Give to the two references the attribute they need and associate them in the actor map.
  • DecentActorRef createPair() (abstract). This function has to be overridden in the extensions. The override has to create a pair actor/actor reference and call setUpActror with these two as arguments.

• DecentActorRef

• DecentAbsActor its special features are :

  • reference to the actor system you get the actor system with public DecentActorSystem getActorSystem().
  • accepted type Each actor has its own accepted type of message. By default it is the one of the system, but is can be set to any other class. No check is done, but the accepted message type of one actor is supposed to be a subclass of the accepted message type of the system.

  We have the following two methods : * void setAcceptedType() that should be used only one. During the creation process of the actor. See the method setUpActor. * Class getAcceptedType().

  • name/serie number Each actor has a name with the usual method String getName(). The default name is based on the creation ordering (zero for the first, and so on). The serie number is private.

ActorSystem getActorSystem()

returns the actor system which created him.

Next implementation : your actor system

In order to make the things clearly you should create your own actor system by derivation from the "decent" actor system. You should create the following classes

• yourActor
• yourActorRef
• yourActorSystem

Some override that you should do

• In the class yourActorSystem

public void setUpActor(yourActorRef ref,yourActor act)
{
    super.setUpActor(ref,act);
    // give here to ref and act the properties they need
}

• In the class yourActorSystem

public yourActorRef createPair()
{
    yourActorRef reference = new yourActorRef();
    yourActor actor = new yourActor();
    setUpActor(reference,actor);
    return reference;
}

• In the class yourActorSystem

@Override
public  yourActor getActor(DecentActorRef reference) { return (yourActor) super.getActor(reference); }

The cast should work because the actor has a reference to its actor system. Thus only actors build from your actor system should get into that method.

• In the class yourActor

@Override
public  YourActorRef getSelfReference() { return (YourActorRef) super.getSelfReference() ; }

• In the class yourActor

@Override
public LatexActorSystem getActorSystem() { return (LatexActorSystem) super.getActorSystem(); }

• In the class yourActorRef

@Override                                   
public LatexActor getActor() { return (LatexActor) super.getActor(); }                                           

• In the class yourActor

    @Override
    public void receive(Message m)
    {
        super.receive(m);
        // do whatever your actor should do.
    }

The Echo actor system

It is only for testing purpose. The system manage the message type "EchoText".

EchoText (the message type)

The EchoText type has two subtypes EchoTextOne and EchoTextTwo that only exist for testing purpose of the accepted_type system.

Special features

• EchoActor has a reference to the last message

TODO

• The actor reference often calls its actor in order to answer questions like the accepted type or the actor system. One should memoize them.

HISTORY

The skeleton is from rcardin, but I got quite far away from his architecture. For example

• I removed the use of generics and add a class variable accepted_type
• I removed the base 'abstract' first implementation.
• I removed the interfaces