libevent

Before you can use any interesting Libevent function, you need to allocate one or more event_base structures. Each event_base structure holds a set of events and can poll to determine which events are active.

struct evconnlistener *evconnlistener_new_bind(struct event_base *base,
    evconnlistener_cb cb, void *ptr, unsigned flags, int backlog,
    const struct sockaddr *sa, int socklen);

evconnlistener_new_bind allocates and returns a new connection listener object. A connection listener uses an event_base to note when there is a new TCP connection on a given listener socket. When a new connection arrives, it invokes the callback function you give it. The ptr pointer will be passed to the callback.

A "bufferevent" consists of an underlying transport (like a socket), a read buffer, and a write buffer.

Every bufferevent has an input buffer and an output buffer. These are of type "struct evbuffer". When you have data to write on a bufferevent, you add it to the output buffer; when a bufferevent has data for you to read, you drain it from the input buffer.

struct bufferevent *bufferevent_socket_new(
    struct event_base *base,
    evutil_socket_t fd,
    enum bufferevent_options options);

Create a socket-based bufferevent using bufferevent_socket_new().

The fd argument is an optional file descriptor for a socket. You can set fd to -1 if you want to set the file descriptor later.

void bufferevent_setcb(struct bufferevent *bufev,
    bufferevent_data_cb readcb, bufferevent_data_cb writecb,
    bufferevent_event_cb eventcb, void *cbarg);

The bufferevent_setcb() function changes one or more of the callbacks of a bufferevent. The readcb, writecb, and eventcb functions are called (respectively) when enough data is read, when enough data is written, or when an event occurs (like when a connection is launched). You can use the last argument to pass data to your callbacks. The following event flags are defined:

BEV_EVENT_CONNECTED

• We finished a requested connection on the bufferevent.

int bufferevent_socket_connect(struct bufferevent *bev,
    struct sockaddr *address, int addrlen);

If the bufferevent’s socket is not yet connected, launch a new connection.

Example:

#include <event2/event.h>
#include <event2/bufferevent.h>
#include <sys/socket.h>
#include <string.h>

void eventcb(struct bufferevent *bev, short events, void *ptr)
{
    if (events & BEV_EVENT_CONNECTED) {
         /* We're connected to 127.0.0.1:8080.   Ordinarily we'd do
            something here, like start reading or writing. */
    } else if (events & BEV_EVENT_ERROR) {
         /* An error occured while connecting. */
    }
}

int main_loop(void)
{
    struct event_base *base;
    struct bufferevent *bev;
    struct sockaddr_in sin;

    base = event_base_new();

    memset(&sin, 0, sizeof(sin));
    sin.sin_family = AF_INET;
    sin.sin_addr.s_addr = htonl(0x7f000001); /* 127.0.0.1 */
    sin.sin_port = htons(8080); /* Port 8080 */

    bev = bufferevent_socket_new(base, -1, BEV_OPT_CLOSE_ON_FREE);

    bufferevent_setcb(bev, NULL, NULL, eventcb, NULL);

    if (bufferevent_socket_connect(bev,
        (struct sockaddr *)&sin, sizeof(sin)) < 0) {
        /* Error starting connection */
        bufferevent_free(bev);
        return -1;
    }

    event_base_dispatch(base);
    return 0;
}