Fos (FastCgi Owin Server)

A .NET 4/Mono compatible FastCgi Owin Server written in C#. This means that it handles FastCgi requests from a webserver such as Nginx or IIS, passes it to an Owin pipeline and responds back to the webserver. It depends on the FastCgiNet library, another one of my GitHub repositories.

Usage

This software is a library for self hosting. This means that you should add a reference to it in your Owin Web Application, and run it like this:

using Fos;
using Fos.Owin;
using Owin;

...
...

private static FosSelfHost FosServer;
public static void Main(string[] args)
{
	using (FosServer = new FosSelfHost(applicationRegistration))
	{
		// Bind on 127.0.0.1, port 9000
		FosServer.Bind(System.Net.IPAddress.Loopback, 9000);

		// If you're on *nix and like unix sockets
		FosServer.Bind("/tmp/fcgisocket.sock");

		// Start the server.
		FosServer.Start(false);
	}
}

static void applicationRegistration(IAppBuilder builder)
{
	// To log statistics get access to the pretty statistics page, you need to create a shunt, like this:
	var statisticsPipeline = builder.New();
	// Here you would add statistics authentication middleware. One example would be only allowing connections from localhost or from admins
	// statisticsPipeline.Use<MyStatisticsPageAuthenticationMiddleware>();
	statisticsPipeline.UseStatisticsLogging(FosServer, new TimeSpan(0, 30, 0));

	// Will shunt to "statisticsPipeline" if request is to "/_stats"
	var statisticsMapping = new Dictionary<string, IAppBuilder>() { { "/_stats", statisticsPipeline } };
	builder.Use<ShuntMiddleware>(statisticsMapping); 

	// This is how you register your application's middleware. This is typically one of your Owin compatible Web frameworks
	builder.Use(typeof(MyApplicationType));
}

Note about Unix Sockets: NuGet's Fos has a bug that will make it throw a NullReferenceException when binding to an Unix Socket with Mono. This is fixed in master. Also, Fos does not sets permissions for you in the socket file, but does remove the socket file when stopped, so make sure permissions are all set.

Architecture

Fos is comprised of a main loop, where it handles new connections and incoming data from established ones. This loop runs synchronous socket operations only when these wouldn't block. In essence, it is an asynchronous loop. The loop is fine and dandy; in fact, this loop model is used by server applications that wish to save system resources when dealing with too many connections, given that the one-thread-per-connection model can quickly eat memory and consume CPU in that scenario. The asynchronous loop is not the solution to hunger in the world, however, because it adds a burden to the user: the user should now be careful not to block it with any time consuming operation. To illustrate this with an example, suppose you have an action triggered by your website's users that will insert thousands of rows into a table in your database. If you don't offset this unit of work (database insertion of thousands of rows) to a different thread, one user can block Fos' main loop until your action is finished, and other visitors will NOT be able to visit your website while that job is not finished. Always remember to use async and await if you are writing C# 5 or to offset work to another thread properly with your language of choice if that work may take some time to complete.

Installation

You can install Fos via NuGet or build it manually for the latest bug fixes and features.

Build instructions: Clone this repository and open this solution in Monodevelop (this is the development IDE I use, in fact) or Visual Studio, then Build. You will find the binary Fos.dll in your bin folder. Yes, it is that simple.

Error handling and logging

You can define a logger that is used internally when handling connections from the FastCgi Server and other operations. You just need to implement the Fos.Logging.IServerLogger interface and register your instance to your instance of FosSelfHost with the SetLogger method. Please note:

• Your implementation of IServerLogger MUST NOT THROW ANY EXCEPTIONS. Your implementation will work side by side with the server itself, and if throws an exception it WILL crash the server. If you are unsure, make sure do add a try .. catch in every method of your implementation.
• If you have set a logger that implements IDisposable, it will be disposed when the server is disposed.
• If the application throws an exception, Fos will display it to the visitor. If you don't want exceptions showing, add middleware that will handle exceptions first thing in your pipeline.

You can also set a custom internal logger that ships with Fos. This logger logs access statistics, exceptions thrown by the application and serves a page that lists them in a nice/simple page. If this page doesn't suit you you're free to implement your own statistics logger, of course. This custom internal logger only ships for practical purposes. If you want to set it, look at the main example. The page that shows the errors and statistics needs some care. Maybe you could help?

Current state and warning

Currently, this server seems to be compatible with NancyFx and Simple.Web (I'm not sure if it is compatible with other frameworks, OWIN leaves some room to implementers in bad way). To use these, you just need to call builder.UseNancy() or builder.UseSimpleWeb() (after using the appropriate namespaces, such as Nancy.Owin or Simple.Web.OwinSupport). That said, please do note:

• I've only used Fos with Nginx, on which it seems to run perfectly and handle a lot of requests without breaking a sweat. Albeit very simple, the application I tested it with did a lot of database work, and a lot of async/await socket operations, and Fos not even once failed in any manner. Also, Fos is practically guaranteed not to stop working if you don't risk yourself with unsafe code (and don't use a custom logger), so please give it a try!
• The API is not guaranteed to remain stable for a while, and most likely will not. Major changes are not expected, though, and since there is not a lot of room for breakage, API changes will probably take you only 5 minutes to adapt your code to.

FastCgi Parameters

TODO

To application builders

If you intend to build an Owin compatible application and run it with this server, be aware of the following:

• So far, the Owin CancellationToken found by the key "owin.CallCancelled" is signaled if and only if the FastCgi socket for the request has been closed

Non standard extensions:

• Fos' IAppBuilder implementation adds a CancellationToken to the Properties dictionary that is signaled when the server is stopped and/or disposed. You can reach this token by the key "host.OnAppDisposing"

Goals

This project's goal is to provide a way for us to use what is best in all worlds to serve our web applications: A robust FastCgi enabled webserver of your choice (nginx, IIS, apache, lighttpd and many others), C# or any other language that compiles to CIL and any Mono compatible operating system. It is also an attempt to stimulate the Owin and .NET OSS ecosystems, since ASP.NET on Mono is likely not to get too much attention in the future, and since it looks like a better, more open alternative to ASP.NET.