async

KTX: Coroutines support and parallelization utilities

Coroutines support and general asynchronous operations utilities for libGDX applications.

Why?

Coroutines-based APIs greatly simplify asynchronous operations and avoid so-called callback hell. Some libGDX APIs - like the Timer - were not written with functional expressions in mind, often using abstract classes instead of functional interfaces. Additionally, they are often tedious to call from within Kotlin. This module aims to hide asynchronous code complexity with coroutines, as well as to improve existing asynchronous APIs with idiomatic Kotlin extensions.

Guide

Setup

Before using ktx-async, make sure to include the Kotlin coroutines library in your Gradle script:

// Groovy DSL:
api group: 'org.jetbrains.kotlinx', name: 'kotlinx-coroutines-core', version: coroutinesVersion

// Kotlin DSL:
api(group = "org.jetbrains.kotlinx", name = "kotlinx-coroutines-core", version = coroutinesVersion)

The coroutinesVersion must match the coroutines version that the ktx-async library was compiled against - otherwise it might cause runtime or compilation errors.

Before Kotlin 1.3, coroutines were an experimental feature and required the following Gradle configuration:

kotlin {
  experimental {
    coroutines 'enable'
  }
}

If you are using a recent version of Kotlin and ktx-async, this declaration is no longer required.

Troubleshooting

If using any coroutines-related classes results in a java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError exception, make sure that the backend module correctly picks up transitive dependencies of the core module. In particular, this error can be seen on iOS with RoboVM if kotlinx-coroutines-core or ktx-async are included as implementation dependencies in the core Gradle module instead of api.

ktx-async was tested on desktop, Android and iOS, and should work on every major platform. If you encounter any issues with launching the coroutines, do not hesitate to create an issue.

Coroutines

Please refer to Kotlin coroutines documentation or tutorials if you are having trouble with this section.

KtxAsync is the default scope you should use instead of the GlobalScope in your KTX applications. By default, it will execute tasks on the main rendering thread. However, if you want to perform some actions asynchronously on different threads, you can use AsyncExecutorDispatcher that uses libGDX cross-platform AsyncExecutor to execute the tasks.

Before using KtxAsync scope, make sure to call KtxAsync.initiate() on the main rendering thread. This is not strictly required if immediate dispatcher is not used, but as a rule of thumb, you should invoke this method in create of your ApplicationListener.

KTX providers 2 main implementations of coroutine dispatchers:

• RenderingThreadDispatcher: executes tasks on the main rendering thread. Available via Dispatchers.KTX. Default dispatcher used by the KtxAsync scope internally.
  • RenderingScope factory method allows to define a CoroutineScope using the RenderingThreadDispatcher.
• AsyncExecutorDispatcher: wraps libGDX AsyncExecutor to execute the tasks. Can be initiated in the following ways:
  • newSingleThreadAsyncContext() factory method: creates an AsyncExecutor with a single thread.
  • newAsyncContext(threads) factory method: creates an AsyncExecutor with the given amount of threads.
  • AsyncExecutorDispatcher constructor: allows to wrap an existing AsyncExecutor. Make sure to set the threads property to the actual threads amount if you rely on this value.

Additionally, ktx-async provides the following utility methods:

• onRenderingThread: suspends the coroutine to execute a task on the main rendering thread and return its result. Should be used if you dispatch a coroutine with a non-rendering thread dispatcher and need to execute some task on the main rendering thread. Syntax sugar for quick context switch.
• isOnRenderingThread: checks if the coroutine is being executed on the main rendering thread.
• skipFrame: attempts to suspend the coroutine for a single render frame of the application. The method is guaranteed to skip at least one frame, but - depending on the thread it was invoked on - it might skip multiple frames. Do not rely on this method for precise frame measurements.
• httpRequest: allows to perform an asynchronous HTTP request.
• RenderingScope factory function is the KTX rendering-thread version of the official MainScope. It creates a scope to launch coroutines in the rendering thread and that has a supervisor job so the whole scope can be cancelled at once.

Utilities

Other asynchronous operations utilities include:

• schedule and interval functions were added to simplify libGDX Timer API. Normally it requires the user to extend an abstract class - these utility functions allow using idiomatic Kotlin lambdas syntax.
• HttpRequestResult is a thread-safe wrapper of HttpResponse that reads and caches HTTP response content. These objects are returned by the coroutines-based HTTP requests API.

Usage examples

Initiating coroutines context upon application creation:

import com.badlogic.gdx.ApplicationAdapter
import ktx.async.KtxAsync

class MyApp : ApplicationAdapter() {
    override fun create() {
        KtxAsync.initiate()
    }
}

Starting a simple coroutine on the main rendering thread:

import com.badlogic.gdx.ApplicationAdapter
import kotlinx.coroutines.launch
import ktx.async.KtxAsync

fun myFirstCoroutine() {
    KtxAsync.launch {
        println("Hello from the rendering thread! ${Thread.currentThread()}")
    }
}

Starting a coroutine with a non-blocking suspension lasting 2 seconds:

import kotlinx.coroutines.delay
import kotlinx.coroutines.launch
import ktx.async.KtxAsync

fun coroutineWithDelay() {
    KtxAsync.launch {
        println("Before delay...")
        val start = System.currentTimeMillis()
        delay(timeMillis = 2000L)
        val end = System.currentTimeMillis()
        println("After delay: ${end - start} milliseconds passed.")
    }
}

Starting a coroutine that skips a single rendering frame by suspension and resumes on the next render call:

import com.badlogic.gdx.ApplicationAdapter
import kotlinx.coroutines.launch
import ktx.async.KtxAsync
import ktx.async.skipFrame

class MyApp : ApplicationAdapter() {
    var frame = 0

    override fun create() {
        KtxAsync.initiate()
        KtxAsync.launch {
            println("On frame: $frame.")
            skipFrame()
            println("On frame: $frame.")
        }
    }

    override fun render() {
        frame++
    }
}

Using AsyncExecutor to perform tasks outside the rendering thread:

import kotlinx.coroutines.launch
import kotlinx.coroutines.withContext
import ktx.async.KtxAsync
import ktx.async.newSingleThreadAsyncContext

fun asyncTask() {
    val executor = newSingleThreadAsyncContext()
    KtxAsync.launch {
        println("Before async: ${Thread.currentThread()}")
        withContext(executor) {
            println("During async: ${Thread.currentThread()}")
        }
        println("After async:  ${Thread.currentThread()}")
    }
}

Using AsyncExecutor with multiple threads to perform sophisticated multithreaded mathematical operations:

import kotlinx.coroutines.async
import kotlinx.coroutines.launch
import ktx.async.KtxAsync
import ktx.async.newAsyncContext

fun multithreading() {
    val executor = newAsyncContext(threads = 4)
    KtxAsync.launch {
        val a = async(executor) { 20 }
        val b = async(executor) { 22 }
        println("The answer to everything: ${a.await() + b.await()}.")
    }
}

Manually switching between coroutine contexts:

import kotlinx.coroutines.Dispatchers
import kotlinx.coroutines.launch
import kotlinx.coroutines.withContext
import ktx.async.KTX
import ktx.async.KtxAsync
import ktx.async.newSingleThreadAsyncContext

fun backAndForth() {
    val executor = newSingleThreadAsyncContext()
    KtxAsync.launch {
        println("On rendering thread: ${Thread.currentThread()}")
        withContext(executor) {
            println("On async thread: ${Thread.currentThread()}")
            withContext(Dispatchers.KTX) {
                println("On rendering thread: ${Thread.currentThread()}")
            }
        }
    }
}

Using utility methods to check and switch the threads:

import kotlinx.coroutines.launch
import ktx.async.*

fun threadSwitch() {
    val executor = newSingleThreadAsyncContext()
    KtxAsync.launch(executor) {
        println("Executor context. ${isOnRenderingThread()}")
        onRenderingThread {
            println("Main KTX context. ${isOnRenderingThread()}")
        }
        println("Executor context. ${isOnRenderingThread()}")
    }
}

Initiating AsyncExecutorDispatchers to perform asynchronous operations outside the rendering thread:

import com.badlogic.gdx.utils.async.AsyncExecutor
import ktx.async.AsyncExecutorDispatcher
import ktx.async.newAsyncContext
import ktx.async.newSingleThreadAsyncContext

// Context with a single thread:
val singleThreaded = newSingleThreadAsyncContext()

// Context with multiple threads:
val multiThreaded = newAsyncContext(threads = 4)

// Context with a custom thread name pattern:
val multiThreadedWithNamedThreads = newAsyncContext(threads = 4, threadName = "MyThread")

// Context with an existing executor:
val executor = AsyncExecutor(2)
val fromExistingExecutor = AsyncExecutorDispatcher(executor, threads = 2)

Starting a coroutine, which performs an HTTP request and resumes on the main rendering thread after receiving the response (requires internet connection to run):

import kotlinx.coroutines.launch
import ktx.async.KtxAsync
import ktx.async.httpRequest

fun http() {
    KtxAsync.launch {
        val response = httpRequest(url = "https://example.com")
        println("""Reading response on ${Thread.currentThread()}. Website content:

${response.contentAsString}""")
    }
}

Performing an asynchronous HTTP request via AsyncExecutor:

import kotlinx.coroutines.async
import kotlinx.coroutines.launch
import ktx.async.KtxAsync
import ktx.async.httpRequest
import ktx.async.newSingleThreadAsyncContext

fun httpAsync() {
    val executor = newSingleThreadAsyncContext()
    KtxAsync.launch {
        val response = async(executor) { httpRequest(url = "https://example.com") }
        response.await()
    }
}

Cancelling a coroutine:

import kotlinx.coroutines.delay
import kotlinx.coroutines.launch
import ktx.async.KtxAsync

fun withCancel() {
    val job = KtxAsync.launch {
        delay(timeMillis = 1000L)
        println("Should not execute this.")
    }
    job.cancel()
}

Creating a coroutine scope to confine jobs' lives to a specific class:

import com.badlogic.gdx.Screen
import kotlinx.coroutines.CoroutineScope
import kotlinx.coroutines.cancel
import kotlinx.coroutines.launch
import ktx.async.httpRequest
import ktx.async.RenderingScope

class MyScreen: Screen, CoroutineScope by RenderingScope() {
  // Implement your application screen here.

  override fun hide() {
    // Cancels any running coroutines when leaving the screen:
    cancel()
  }

  // Starts coroutine in this screen's scope:
  private fun loadSomething() = launch {
    val result = httpRequest(url = "https://example.com")
    webResultLabel.text = result.contentAsString
  }
}

Creating a custom cancellable scope with an AsyncExecutor dispatcher:

import kotlinx.coroutines.CoroutineScope
import kotlinx.coroutines.SupervisorJob
import ktx.async.AsyncExecutorDispatcher
import ktx.async.newSingleThreadAsyncContext

class MyScope(dispatcher: AsyncExecutorDispatcher)
  : CoroutineScope by CoroutineScope(SupervisorJob() + dispatcher)

val myScope = MyScope(newSingleThreadAsyncContext())

Scheduling a task executed on the main rendering thread after one second:

import ktx.async.schedule

val taskCallback = schedule(delaySeconds = 1f) {
    println("Hello!")
}

Scheduling a task repeatedly executed on the main rendering thread after one second:

import ktx.async.interval

val taskCallback = interval(delaySeconds = 1f, intervalSeconds = 1f) {
    println("Hello again!")
}

Alternatives

• Standard Kotlin coroutines libraries might be used along with custom thread pools. They do not offer the same level of compatibility with existing libGDX APIs though.

Additional documentation

• Official libGDX threading article.
• Coroutines language reference.
• Coroutines repository.