RTI Persistence Service

Release Notes

Version 5.0.0

Release Notes

1 Compatibility

RTI® Persistence Service is included with RTI Connext™ Professional Edition. If you choose to use it, it must be installed on top of RTI Connext (formerly RTI Data Distribution Service) with the same version number.

Persistence Service is compatible with Connext, as well as RTI Data Distribution Service 4.5[b-e], 4.4d, 4.3e and 4.2e; it is supported on the architectures listed in Table 1.1.

Note: Persistence Service is not compatible with applications built with RTI Data Distribution Ser- vice 4.5e and earlier releases when communicating over shared memory. For more information, please see the Transport Compatibility section in the RTI Core Libraries and Utilities Release Notes.

Table 1.1 Supported Architectures

	Platforms	Operating System	Architecture	Format
	AIX	AIX 5.3	p5AIX5.3xlc9.0	Executable
		(no external database support)	64p5AIX5.3xlc9.0
	INTEGRITY	INTEGRITY 10.0.0	pentiumInty10.0.0.pcx86	Library
		CentOS 5.4, 5.5 (2.6 kernel)	i86Linux2.6gcc4.1.2	Executable
			x64Linux2.6gcc4.1.2
		Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.0	i86Linux2.6gcc4.1.1	Executable
			x64Linux2.6gcc4.1.1
	Linux®	Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.1, 5.2, 5.4, 5.5	i86Linux2.6gcc4.1.2	Executable
			x64Linux2.6gcc4.1.2
		Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.0, 6.1	i86Linux2.6gcc4.4.5	Executable
		(no external database support)	x64Linux2.6gcc4.4.5
		Ubuntu® Server 10.04 (2.6 kernel)	i86Linux2.6gcc4.4.3	Executable
		(no external database support)	x64Linux2.6gcc4.4.3
	Solaris™	Solaris 2.10	sparcSol2.10gcc3.4.2	Executable
		(no external database support)	sparc64Sol2.10gcc3.4.2

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Table 1.1 Supported Architectures

Platforms	Operating System	Architecture	Format
	Windows 7	i86Win32VS2010	Executable
		x64Win64VS2010
	Windows Server® 2008 R2	x64Win64VS2010	Executable
	Windows 2000	i86Win32VS2005	Executable
Windows®
	Windows 2003	i86Win32VS2005	Executable
	Windows Vista®	i86Win32VS2005	Executable
		i86Win32VS2008
	Windows XP Professional	i86Win32VS2005	Executable
		i86Win32VS2008

1.1Command-Line Options Compatibility

Starting with version 4.5b, the command-line parameter -srvName has been replaced with -cfgName, which is a required parameter.

1.2Library API Compatibility

The following fields in the RTI_PersistenceServiceProperty structure have new names (starting in 4.5d Rev. 12):

❏app_name has been replaced with application_name

❏stack_size has been replaced with thread_stack_size

1.3Persistent Storage

When Persistence Service is configured in PERSISTENT mode, you may choose between storing the topic data in files or in an external relational database.

In principle, you can use any database that provides an ODBC driver, since ODBC is a standard. However, not all ODBC databases support the same feature set. Therefore, there is no guarantee that the persistent durability features will work with an arbitrary ODBC driver.

Persistence Service has been tested with the MySQL 5.1.44 with MySQL ODBC 5.1.6.

The usage of MySQL requires the separate installation of the MySQL ODBC 5.1.6 (or higher) driver. For non-Windows platforms, the installation of UnixODBC 2.2.12 (or higher) is also required.

1.4Persistence Service Synchronization

Starting with version 5.0.0, the format of the <synchronization> tag value under

<persistence_service> tag has changed.

Before 5.0.0, the value of the tag was a boolean indicating whether or not sample synchroniza- tion was enabled.

Starting in 5.0.0, there are two different kinds of information that can be synchronized indepen- dently: data samples and durable subscription state. The <synchronization> tag value is no lon- ger a boolean; now it is a complex value that may contain up to three new tags:

❏<synchronize_data>

❏<synchronize_durable_subscriptions>

❏<durable_subscription_synchronization_period>

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Available Documentation

Any existing XML configuration files that use the old <synchronization> tag as follows:

<dds> <persistence_service>

...

<synchronization>true</synchronization> </persistence_service>

must be changed to:

<dds> <persistence_service>

...

<synchronization> <synchronize_data>true</synchronize_data>

</synchronization> </persistence_service>

For additional information on Persistence Service synchronization, see the RTI Persistence Service chapters in the RTI Core Libraries and Utilities User’s Manual.

2 Available Documentation

The following documentation is provided with the Persistence Service distribution. (The paths show where the files are located after Persistence Service has been installed in <NDDSHOME>):

❏Installation instructions: RTI Persistence Service Installation Guide

(<NDDSHOME>/doc/pdf/RTI_Persistence_Service_InstallationGuide.pdf, also avail- able for download from RTI’s Self Service Portal.)

❏General information on RTI Persistence Service:

Open <NDDSHOME>/ReadMe.html, then select RTI Persistence Service.

❏Example code: <NDDSHOME>/example/<language>/helloWorldPersistence. Additional documentation is provided with Connext:

❏Configuration, use cases, and execution of Persistence Service:

RTI Core Libraries and Utilities User’s Manual

(<NDDSHOME>/doc/pdf/RTI_CoreLibrariesAndUtilities_UsersManual.pdf)

❏Overview of persistence and durability features:

Open <NDDSHOME>/ReadMe.html, choose your desired API (C, C++, or Java), then select Modules, Connext API Reference, Durability and Persistence.

3 What’s New in 5.0.0

3.1Durable Subscriptions Support

With the Durable Subscriptions feature, you can configure Persistence Service to keep samples in memory or persistent storage until they are received by a set of named subscriptions.

Related XML configuration tags:

❏<durable_subscriptions> under <participant>

❏<purge_samples_after_acknowledgment> under <persistence_service>

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❏<synchronize_durable_subscriptions> and <durable_ subscription_ synchronization_ period> under <synchronization>

❏<allow_durable_subscriptions> under <persistence_group>

For additional information on Durable Subscriptions, see the RTI Persistence Service documenta- tion in the RTI Core Libraries and Utilities User’s Manual.

3.2Delegated Reliability Support

The delegated reliability feature offloads the reliability-protocol tasks (processing of NACK traffic and HB sending) from the original DataWriter to one or more Persistence Service instances. This feature is useful in slow consumers scenarios where a DataWriter should not slow down due to the presence of a matching slow DataReader in the system.

With delegated reliability, a RELIABLE DataWriter configured with TRANSIENT or PERSIS- TENT durability will communicate using BEST-EFFORT channels with matching RELIABLE DataReaders. Lost samples will be repaired by one or more instances of Persistence Service.

For additional information on Delegated Reliability, see the RTI Persistence Service documenta- tion in the RTI Core Libraries and Utilities User’s Manual.

3.3Sample Logging Support

Sample logging allows you to decouple a PRSTDataReader from the corresponding PRSTDataW- riter by buffering the read samples onto disk before they get persisted into the PRSTDataWriter queue. Using the sample logging feature in combination with delegated reliability addresses slow-consumers scenarios where you do not want to slow down the original DataWriter.

The sample logging feature is only supported on Linux and Windows platforms.

Related XML configuration tags:

❏<sample_logging> under <persistence_group>

For additional information on using sample logging, see the RTI Persistence Service documenta- tion in the RTI Core Libraries and Utilities User’s Manual.

3.4Performance Improvements

The following new XML tags can be used to improve the performance of RTI Persistence Service when it runs in PERSISTENT mode:

❏<late_joiner_read_batch>

❏<writer_ack_period>

❏<writer_checkpoint_period>

❏<writer_checkpoint_volume>

For additional information on these tags, see the RTI Persistence Service documentation in the RTI Core Libraries and Utilities User’s Manual.

3.5Waitset Support

RTI Persistence Service can be configured to use waitsets to read data from the PRSTDataReader using the new XML tag <use_wait_set>.

For additional information on this tag, see the RTI Persistence Service documentation in RTI Core Libraries and Utilities User’s Manual.

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What’s New in 5.0.0

3.6Application-Level Acknowledgment

Starting with release 5.0.0, you can configure the PRSTDataWriters and PRSTDataReaders cre- ated by RTI Persistence Service to do application-level acknowledgment using the existing QoS tags <datawriter_qos> and <datareader_qos> under <persistence_group>.

For additional information on application-level acknowledgment, see the RTI Core Libraries and Utilities User’s Manual.

3.7Support for Environment Variables in XML Configuration Files

This new feature allows you to refer to an environment variable within an XML tag. When the Connext XML parser parses the configuration file, it will expand the environment variable. To refer to an environment variable, use the format $(MY_VARIABLE).

For example:

<element>

<name>The name is $(MY_NAME)</name> <value>The value is $(MY_VALUE)</value>

</element>

3.8Attribute ‘is_default_qos’ No Longer Supported

The is_default_qos attribute is no longer supported in Persistence Service. (For more information, please see Section 4.1.)

3.9Support for Extensible Types

Persistence Service includes partial support for the “Extensible and Dynamic Topic Types for DDS” specification from the Object Management Group (OMG). See Section 27.13 in the RTI Core Libraries and Utilities User’s Manual for details.

3.10Integrated Support for Distributed Logger

The RTI Distributed Logger library is now included with Persistence Service.

When you enable the Distributed Logger library, Persistence Service will publish its log messages to a Connext domain. Then you can visualize the log message data with RTI Monitor, a separate GUI application that can run on the same host as your application or on a different host. Since the data is provided in a Connext topic, you can also use rtiddsspy or even write your own visual- ization tool.

For details on how to enable the Distributed Logger library, see the chapter on Configuring Persis- tence Service in the RTI Core Libraries and Utilities User’s Manual, as well as the RTI Distributed Log- ger Getting Started Guide. These documents will show you how to use the new XML configuration tag, <distributed_logger>.

3.11Propagation of Service Version as a DomainParticipant Property

In this release, the Persistence Service version number is propagated as a DomainParticipant prop- erty called "rti.service.version". The format of the value is as follows:

<major>.<minor>.<release>.rev<revision>

The version property is set in all the DomainParticipants created by the service.

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4 What’s Fixed in 5.0.0

4.1Remote Administration Commands not Received

Persistence Service did not ignore the is_default_qos setting in input XML files. As a conse- quence, you may have seen unexpected behavior. For example, if remote administration was enabled, you may have run into a scenario where the DataWriter and DataReader created by Per- sistence Service to receive administration commands had PERSISTENT Durability. This could have occurred when running Persistence Service from a directory that contained a file called

USER_QOS_PROFILES.xml with is_default_qos set to TRUE in a profile where the DataWriter and DataReader QoS had PERSISTENT durability. Your original intention may have been to use USER_QOS_PROFILES.xml to configure your application. However, because Persistence Ser- vice runs from the same directory as the entities that it creates, it used the application default profile as well.

To be consistent with RTI Routing Service and a provide a better out-of-the-box experience, the is_default_qos attribute is no longer supported in Persistence Service.

[RTI Issue ID PERSISTENCE-56]

5 Known Issues

5.1TCP Transport not Supported

Persistence Service does not support the TCP transport.

5.2Coherent Changes are Not Propagated as a Coherent Set

Persistence Service will propagate the samples inside a coherent change. However, it will propa- gate these samples individually, not as a coherent set.

5.3BLOBs Not Supported by OBDC Storage

The ODBC storage does not support BLOBs. The maximum size for a serialized sample is 65535 bytes in MySQL.

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