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     STYXPERSIST(2)                                     STYXPERSIST(2)

     NAME
          styxpersist - persistent Styx connection

     SYNOPSIS
          include "sys.m";
          include "styxpersist.m";
          styxpersist := load Styxpersist Styxpersist->PATH;

          init: fn(clientfd: ref Sys->FD, usefac: int, keyspec: string)
                  : (chan of chan of ref Sys->FD, string);

     DESCRIPTION
          Styxpersist tries to maintain a persistent Styx connection
          for its client.  Init starts a process to serve Styx for the
          client on clientfd. If usefac is non-zero, styxpersist will
          use factotum(2) to do plan 9-style authentication if neces-
          sary, and keyspec gives attribute-value pairs to pass to
          factotum's proxy function.

          Init returns a tuple, say (c, err).  If things have started
          successfully, c holds a channel that styxpersist uses to
          request a new connection to the server.  The caller of init
          should arrange that a process is ready to repeatedly receive
          on this channel, dial the server, and send the resulting
          file descriptor (or nil if the connection was unsuccessful)
          on the channel received,

          If init failed, c will be nil and err describes the error.

          If the server goes down, it redials as above, and tries to
          re-open all the files that were open in the previous connec-
          tion.  In the meantime all client access to the namespace is
          blocked.

          Note that this service should only be used on conventional
          file servers, where most reads and writes are idempotent.

     SOURCE
          /appl/lib/styxpersist.b

     BUGS
          Even on a conventional fileserver, some operations are non-
          idempotent; namely create, rename, remove, and write to an
          append-only file.  If a fileserver dies while such a request
          is outstanding, it is unclear what it should do. Currently
          it returns an error to the client if such a sitution occurs.

          Styxpersist is dependent on the capabilities of the local
          factotum to re-authenticate Plan 9 style. If a client uses
          an external factotum with different keys, styxpersist may be

     STYXPERSIST(2)                                     STYXPERSIST(2)

          unable to re-authenticate.

     SEE ALSO
          mount(1), sys-dial(2)