My python script constantly has to send messages to RabbitMQ once it receives one from another data source. The frequency in which the python script sends them can vary, say, 1 minute - 30 minutes.
Here's how I establish a connection to RabbitMQ:
rabt_conn = pika.BlockingConnection(pika.ConnectionParameters("some_host"))
channel = rbt_conn.channel()
I just got an exception
pika.exceptions.ConnectionClosed
How can I reconnect to it? What's the best way? Is there any "strategy"? Is there an ability to send pings to keep a connection alive or set timeout?
Any pointers will be appreciated.
RabbitMQ uses heartbeats to detect and close "dead" connections and to prevent network devices (firewalls etc.) from terminating "idle" connections. From version 3.5.5 on, the default timeout is set to 60 seconds (previously it was ~10 minutes). From the docs:
Heartbeat frames are sent about every timeout / 2 seconds. After two missed heartbeats, the peer is considered to be unreachable.
The problem with Pika's BlockingConnection is that it is unable to respond to heartbeats until some API call is made (for example, channel.basic_publish()
, connection.sleep()
, etc).
The approaches I found so far:
RabbitMQ negotiates the timeout with the client when establishing the connection. In theory, it should be possible to override the server default value with a bigger one using the heartbeat_interval
argument, but the current Pika version (0.10.0) uses the min value between those offered by the server and the client. This issue is fixed on current master.
On the other hand, is possible to deactivate the heartbeat functionality completely by setting the heartbeat_interval
argument to 0
, which may well drive you into new issues (firewalls dropping connections, etc)
Expanding on @itsafire's answer, you can write your own publisher class, letting you reconnect when required. An example naive implementation:
import logging
import json
import pika
class Publisher:
EXCHANGE='my_exchange'
TYPE='topic'
ROUTING_KEY = 'some_routing_key'
def __init__(self, host, virtual_host, username, password):
self._params = pika.connection.ConnectionParameters(
host=host,
virtual_host=virtual_host,
credentials=pika.credentials.PlainCredentials(username, password))
self._conn = None
self._channel = None
def connect(self):
if not self._conn or self._conn.is_closed:
self._conn = pika.BlockingConnection(self._params)
self._channel = self._conn.channel()
self._channel.exchange_declare(exchange=self.EXCHANGE,
type=self.TYPE)
def _publish(self, msg):
self._channel.basic_publish(exchange=self.EXCHANGE,
routing_key=self.ROUTING_KEY,
body=json.dumps(msg).encode())
logging.debug('message sent: %s', msg)
def publish(self, msg):
"""Publish msg, reconnecting if necessary."""
try:
self._publish(msg)
except pika.exceptions.ConnectionClosed:
logging.debug('reconnecting to queue')
self.connect()
self._publish(msg)
def close(self):
if self._conn and self._conn.is_open:
logging.debug('closing queue connection')
self._conn.close()
Other possibilities which I yet didn't explore:
connection.sleep()
to responde to server heartbeats.