D-Bus Tutorial
Version 0.5.0
20 August 2006
Havoc
Pennington
Red Hat, Inc.
hp@pobox.com
David
Wheeler
John
Palmieri
Red Hat, Inc.
johnp@redhat.com
Colin
Walters
Red Hat, Inc.
walters@redhat.com
Tutorial Work In Progress
This tutorial is not complete; it probably contains some useful information, but
also has plenty of gaps. Right now, you'll also need to refer to the D-Bus specification,
Doxygen reference documentation, and look at some examples of how other apps use D-Bus.
Enhancing the tutorial is definitely encouraged - send your patches or suggestions to the
mailing list. If you create a D-Bus binding, please add a section to the tutorial for your
binding, if only a short section with a couple of examples.
What is D-Bus?
D-Bus is a system for interprocess communication
(IPC). Architecturally, it has several layers:
A library, libdbus, that allows two
applications to connect to each other and exchange messages.
A message bus daemon executable, built on
libdbus, that multiple applications can connect to. The daemon can
route messages from one application to zero or more other
applications.
Wrapper libraries or bindings
based on particular application frameworks. For example, libdbus-glib and
libdbus-qt. There are also bindings to languages such as
Python. These wrapper libraries are the API most people should use,
as they simplify the details of D-Bus programming. libdbus is
intended to be a low-level backend for the higher level bindings.
Much of the libdbus API is only useful for binding implementation.
libdbus only supports one-to-one connections, just like a raw network
socket. However, rather than sending byte streams over the connection, you
send messages. Messages have a header identifying
the kind of message, and a body containing a data payload. libdbus also
abstracts the exact transport used (sockets vs. whatever else), and
handles details such as authentication.
The message bus daemon forms the hub of a wheel. Each spoke of the wheel
is a one-to-one connection to an application using libdbus. An
application sends a message to the bus daemon over its spoke, and the bus
daemon forwards the message to other connected applications as
appropriate. Think of the daemon as a router.
The bus daemon has multiple instances on a typical computer. The
first instance is a machine-global singleton, that is, a system daemon
similar to sendmail or Apache. This instance has heavy security
restrictions on what messages it will accept, and is used for systemwide
communication. The other instances are created one per user login session.
These instances allow applications in the user's session to communicate
with one another.
The systemwide and per-user daemons are separate. Normal within-session
IPC does not involve the systemwide message bus process and vice versa.
D-Bus applications
There are many, many technologies in the world that have "Inter-process
communication" or "networking" in their stated purpose: CORBA, DCE, DCOM, DCOP, XML-RPC, SOAP, MBUS, Internet Communications Engine (ICE),
and probably hundreds more.
Each of these is tailored for particular kinds of application.
D-Bus is designed for two specific cases:
Communication between desktop applications in the same desktop
session; to allow integration of the desktop session as a whole,
and address issues of process lifecycle (when do desktop components
start and stop running).
Communication between the desktop session and the operating system,
where the operating system would typically include the kernel
and any system daemons or processes.
For the within-desktop-session use case, the GNOME and KDE desktops
have significant previous experience with different IPC solutions
such as CORBA and DCOP. D-Bus is built on that experience and
carefully tailored to meet the needs of these desktop projects
in particular. D-Bus may or may not be appropriate for other
applications; the FAQ has some comparisons to other IPC systems.
The problem solved by the systemwide or communication-with-the-OS case
is explained well by the following text from the Linux Hotplug project:
A gap in current Linux support is that policies with any sort of
dynamic "interact with user" component aren't currently
supported. For example, that's often needed the first time a network
adapter or printer is connected, and to determine appropriate places
to mount disk drives. It would seem that such actions could be
supported for any case where a responsible human can be identified:
single user workstations, or any system which is remotely
administered.
This is a classic "remote sysadmin" problem, where in this case
hotplugging needs to deliver an event from one security domain
(operating system kernel, in this case) to another (desktop for
logged-in user, or remote sysadmin). Any effective response must go
the other way: the remote domain taking some action that lets the
kernel expose the desired device capabilities. (The action can often
be taken asynchronously, for example letting new hardware be idle
until a meeting finishes.) At this writing, Linux doesn't have
widely adopted solutions to such problems. However, the new D-Bus
work may begin to solve that problem.
D-Bus may happen to be useful for purposes other than the one it was
designed for. Its general properties that distinguish it from
other forms of IPC are:
Binary protocol designed to be used asynchronously
(similar in spirit to the X Window System protocol).
Stateful, reliable connections held open over time.
The message bus is a daemon, not a "swarm" or
distributed architecture.
Many implementation and deployment issues are specified rather
than left ambiguous/configurable/pluggable.
Semantics are similar to the existing DCOP system, allowing
KDE to adopt it more easily.
Security features to support the systemwide mode of the
message bus.
Concepts
Some basic concepts apply no matter what application framework you're
using to write a D-Bus application. The exact code you write will be
different for GLib vs. Qt vs. Python applications, however.
Here is a diagram (png svg) that may help you visualize the concepts
that follow.
Native Objects and Object Paths
Your programming framework probably defines what an "object" is like;
usually with a base class. For example: java.lang.Object, GObject, QObject,
python's base Object, or whatever. Let's call this a native object.
The low-level D-Bus protocol, and corresponding libdbus API, does not care about native objects.
However, it provides a concept called an
object path. The idea of an object path is that
higher-level bindings can name native object instances, and allow remote applications
to refer to them.
The object path
looks like a filesystem path, for example an object could be
named /org/kde/kspread/sheets/3/cells/4/5.
Human-readable paths are nice, but you are free to create an
object named /com/mycompany/c5yo817y0c1y1c5b
if it makes sense for your application.
Namespacing object paths is smart, by starting them with the components
of a domain name you own (e.g. /org/kde). This
keeps different code modules in the same process from stepping
on one another's toes.
Methods and Signals
Each object has members; the two kinds of member
are methods and
signals. Methods are operations that can be
invoked on an object, with optional input (aka arguments or "in
parameters") and output (aka return values or "out parameters").
Signals are broadcasts from the object to any interested observers
of the object; signals may contain a data payload.
Both methods and signals are referred to by name, such as
"Frobate" or "OnClicked".
Interfaces
Each object supports one or more interfaces.
Think of an interface as a named group of methods and signals,
just as it is in GLib or Qt or Java. Interfaces define the
type of an object instance.
DBus identifies interfaces with a simple namespaced string,
something like org.freedesktop.Introspectable.
Most bindings will map these interface names directly to
the appropriate programming language construct, for example
to Java interfaces or C++ pure virtual classes.
Proxies
A proxy object is a convenient native object created to
represent a remote object in another process. The low-level DBus API involves manually creating
a method call message, sending it, then manually receiving and processing
the method reply message. Higher-level bindings provide proxies as an alternative.
Proxies look like a normal native object; but when you invoke a method on the proxy
object, the binding converts it into a DBus method call message, waits for the reply
message, unpacks the return value, and returns it from the native method..
In pseudocode, programming without proxies might look like this:
Message message = new Message("/remote/object/path", "MethodName", arg1, arg2);
Connection connection = getBusConnection();
connection.send(message);
Message reply = connection.waitForReply(message);
if (reply.isError()) {
} else {
Object returnValue = reply.getReturnValue();
}
Programming with proxies might look like this:
Proxy proxy = new Proxy(getBusConnection(), "/remote/object/path");
Object returnValue = proxy.MethodName(arg1, arg2);
Bus Names
When each application connects to the bus daemon, the daemon immediately
assigns it a name, called the unique connection name.
A unique name begins with a ':' (colon) character. These names are never
reused during the lifetime of the bus daemon - that is, you know
a given name will always refer to the same application.
An example of a unique name might be
:34-907. The numbers after the colon have
no meaning other than their uniqueness.
When a name is mapped
to a particular application's connection, that application is said to
own that name.
Applications may ask to own additional well-known
names. For example, you could write a specification to
define a name called com.mycompany.TextEditor.
Your definition could specify that to own this name, an application
should have an object at the path
/com/mycompany/TextFileManager supporting the
interface org.freedesktop.FileHandler.
Applications could then send messages to this bus name,
object, and interface to execute method calls.
You could think of the unique names as IP addresses, and the
well-known names as domain names. So
com.mycompany.TextEditor might map to something like
:34-907 just as mycompany.com maps
to something like 192.168.0.5.
Names have a second important use, other than routing messages. They
are used to track lifecycle. When an application exits (or crashes), its
connection to the message bus will be closed by the operating system
kernel. The message bus then sends out notification messages telling
remaining applications that the application's names have lost their
owner. By tracking these notifications, your application can reliably
monitor the lifetime of other applications.
Bus names can also be used to coordinate single-instance applications.
If you want to be sure only one
com.mycompany.TextEditor application is running for
example, have the text editor application exit if the bus name already
has an owner.
Addresses
Applications using D-Bus are either servers or clients. A server
listens for incoming connections; a client connects to a server. Once
the connection is established, it is a symmetric flow of messages; the
client-server distinction only matters when setting up the
connection.
If you're using the bus daemon, as you probably are, your application
will be a client of the bus daemon. That is, the bus daemon listens
for connections and your application initiates a connection to the bus
daemon.
A D-Bus address specifies where a server will
listen, and where a client will connect. For example, the address
unix:path=/tmp/abcdef specifies that the server will
listen on a UNIX domain socket at the path
/tmp/abcdef and the client will connect to that
socket. An address can also specify TCP/IP sockets, or any other
transport defined in future iterations of the D-Bus specification.
When using D-Bus with a message bus daemon,
libdbus automatically discovers the address of the per-session bus
daemon by reading an environment variable. It discovers the
systemwide bus daemon by checking a well-known UNIX domain socket path
(though you can override this address with an environment variable).
If you're using D-Bus without a bus daemon, it's up to you to
define which application will be the server and which will be
the client, and specify a mechanism for them to agree on
the server's address. This is an unusual case.
Big Conceptual Picture
Pulling all these concepts together, to specify a particular
method call on a particular object instance, a number of
nested components have to be named:
Address -> [Bus Name] -> Path -> Interface -> Method
The bus name is in brackets to indicate that it's optional -- you only
provide a name to route the method call to the right application
when using the bus daemon. If you have a direct connection to another
application, bus names aren't used; there's no bus daemon.
The interface is also optional, primarily for historical
reasons; DCOP does not require specifying the interface,
instead simply forbidding duplicate method names
on the same object instance. D-Bus will thus let you
omit the interface, but if your method name is ambiguous
it is undefined which method will be invoked.
Messages - Behind the Scenes
D-Bus works by sending messages between processes. If you're using
a sufficiently high-level binding, you may never work with messages directly.
There are 4 message types:
Method call messages ask to invoke a method
on an object.
Method return messages return the results
of invoking a method.
Error messages return an exception caused by
invoking a method.
Signal messages are notifications that a given signal
has been emitted (that an event has occurred).
You could also think of these as "event" messages.
A method call maps very simply to messages: you send a method call
message, and receive either a method return message or an error message
in reply.
Each message has a header, including fields,
and a body, including arguments. You can think
of the header as the routing information for the message, and the body as the payload.
Header fields might include the sender bus name, destination bus name, method or signal name,
and so forth. One of the header fields is a type signature describing the
values found in the body. For example, the letter "i" means "32-bit integer" so the signature
"ii" means the payload has two 32-bit integers.
Calling a Method - Behind the Scenes
A method call in DBus consists of two messages; a method call message sent from process A to process B,
and a matching method reply message sent from process B to process A. Both the call and the reply messages
are routed through the bus daemon. The caller includes a different serial number in each call message, and the
reply message includes this number to allow the caller to match replies to calls.
The call message will contain any arguments to the method.
The reply message may indicate an error, or may contain data returned by the method.
A method invocation in DBus happens as follows:
The language binding may provide a proxy, such that invoking a method on
an in-process object invokes a method on a remote object in another process. If so, the
application calls a method on the proxy, and the proxy
constructs a method call message to send to the remote process.
For more low-level APIs, the application may construct a method call message itself, without
using a proxy.
In either case, the method call message contains: a bus name belonging to the remote process; the name of the method;
the arguments to the method; an object path inside the remote process; and optionally the name of the
interface that specifies the method.
The method call message is sent to the bus daemon.
The bus daemon looks at the destination bus name. If a process owns that name,
the bus daemon forwards the method call to that process. Otherwise, the bus daemon
creates an error message and sends it back as the reply to the method call message.
The receiving process unpacks the method call message. In a simple low-level API situation, it
may immediately run the method and send a method reply message to the bus daemon.
When using a high-level binding API, the binding might examine the object path, interface,
and method name, and convert the method call message into an invocation of a method on
a native object (GObject, java.lang.Object, QObject, etc.), then convert the return
value from the native method into a method reply message.
The bus daemon receives the method reply message and sends it to the process that
made the method call.
The process that made the method call looks at the method reply and makes use of any
return values included in the reply. The reply may also indicate that an error occurred.
When using a binding, the method reply message may be converted into the return value of
of a proxy method, or into an exception.
The bus daemon never reorders messages. That is, if you send two method call messages to the same recipient,
they will be received in the order they were sent. The recipient is not required to reply to the calls
in order, however; for example, it may process each method call in a separate thread, and return reply messages
in an undefined order depending on when the threads complete. Method calls have a unique serial
number used by the method caller to match reply messages to call messages.
Emitting a Signal - Behind the Scenes
A signal in DBus consists of a single message, sent by one process to any number of other processes.
That is, a signal is a unidirectional broadcast. The signal may contain arguments (a data payload), but
because it is a broadcast, it never has a "return value." Contrast this with a method call
(see ) where the method call message has a matching method reply message.
The emitter (aka sender) of a signal has no knowledge of the signal recipients. Recipients register
with the bus daemon to receive signals based on "match rules" - these rules would typically include the sender and
the signal name. The bus daemon sends each signal only to recipients who have expressed interest in that
signal.
A signal in DBus happens as follows:
A signal message is created and sent to the bus daemon. When using the low-level API this may be
done manually, with certain bindings it may be done for you by the binding when a native object
emits a native signal or event.
The signal message contains the name of the interface that specifies the signal;
the name of the signal; the bus name of the process sending the signal; and
any arguments
Any process on the message bus can register "match rules" indicating which signals it
is interested in. The bus has a list of registered match rules.
The bus daemon examines the signal and determines which processes are interested in it.
It sends the signal message to these processes.
Each process receiving the signal decides what to do with it; if using a binding,
the binding may choose to emit a native signal on a proxy object. If using the
low-level API, the process may just look at the signal sender and name and decide
what to do based on that.
Introspection
D-Bus objects may support the interface org.freedesktop.DBus.Introspectable.
This interface has one method Introspect which takes no arguments and returns
an XML string. The XML string describes the interfaces, methods, and signals of the object.
See the D-Bus specification for more details on this introspection format.
GLib API: Using Remote Objects
The GLib binding is defined in the header file
<dbus/dbus-glib.h>.
D-Bus - GLib type mappings
The heart of the GLib bindings for D-Bus is the mapping it
provides between D-Bus "type signatures" and GLib types
(GType). The D-Bus type system is composed of
a number of "basic" types, along with several "container" types.
Basic type mappings
Below is a list of the basic types, along with their associated
mapping to a GType.
D-Bus basic type
GType
Free function
Notes
BYTE
G_TYPE_UCHAR
BOOLEAN
G_TYPE_BOOLEAN
INT16
G_TYPE_INT
Will be changed to a G_TYPE_INT16 once GLib has it
UINT16
G_TYPE_UINT
Will be changed to a G_TYPE_UINT16 once GLib has it
INT32
G_TYPE_INT
Will be changed to a G_TYPE_INT32 once GLib has it
UINT32
G_TYPE_UINT
Will be changed to a G_TYPE_UINT32 once GLib has it
INT64
G_TYPE_GINT64
UINT64
G_TYPE_GUINT64
DOUBLE
G_TYPE_DOUBLE
STRING
G_TYPE_STRING
g_free
OBJECT_PATH
DBUS_TYPE_G_PROXY
g_object_unref
The returned proxy does not have an interface set; use dbus_g_proxy_set_interface to invoke methods
As you can see, the basic mapping is fairly straightforward.
Container type mappings
The D-Bus type system also has a number of "container"
types, such as DBUS_TYPE_ARRAY and
DBUS_TYPE_STRUCT. The D-Bus type system
is fully recursive, so one can for example have an array of
array of strings (i.e. type signature
aas).
However, not all of these types are in common use; for
example, at the time of this writing the author knows of no
one using DBUS_TYPE_STRUCT, or a
DBUS_TYPE_ARRAY containing any non-basic
type. The approach the GLib bindings take is pragmatic; try
to map the most common types in the most obvious way, and
let using less common and more complex types be less
"natural".
First, D-Bus type signatures which have an "obvious"
corresponding built-in GLib type are mapped using that type:
D-Bus type signature
Description
GType
C typedef
Free function
Notes
as
Array of strings
G_TYPE_STRV
char **
g_strfreev
v
Generic value container
G_TYPE_VALUE
GValue *
g_value_unset
The calling conventions for values expect that method callers have allocated return values; see below.
The next most common recursive type signatures are arrays of
basic values. The most obvious mapping for arrays of basic
types is a GArray. Now, GLib does not
provide a builtin GType for
GArray. However, we actually need more than
that - we need a "parameterized" type which includes the
contained type. Why we need this we will see below.
The approach taken is to create these types in the D-Bus GLib
bindings; however, there is nothing D-Bus specific about them.
In the future, we hope to include such "fundamental" types in GLib
itself.
D-Bus type signature
Description
GType
C typedef
Free function
Notes
ay
Array of bytes
DBUS_TYPE_G_BYTE_ARRAY
GArray *
g_array_free
au
Array of uint
DBUS_TYPE_G_UINT_ARRAY
GArray *
g_array_free
ai
Array of int
DBUS_TYPE_G_INT_ARRAY
GArray *
g_array_free
ax
Array of int64
DBUS_TYPE_G_INT64_ARRAY
GArray *
g_array_free
at
Array of uint64
DBUS_TYPE_G_UINT64_ARRAY
GArray *
g_array_free
ad
Array of double
DBUS_TYPE_G_DOUBLE_ARRAY
GArray *
g_array_free
ab
Array of boolean
DBUS_TYPE_G_BOOLEAN_ARRAY
GArray *
g_array_free
D-Bus also includes a special type DBUS_TYPE_DICT_ENTRY which
is only valid in arrays. It's intended to be mapped to a "dictionary"
type by bindings. The obvious GLib mapping here is GHashTable. Again,
however, there is no builtin GType for a GHashTable.
Moreover, just like for arrays, we need a parameterized type so that
the bindings can communiate which types are contained in the hash table.
At present, only strings are supported. Work is in progress to
include more types.
D-Bus type signature
Description
GType
C typedef
Free function
Notes
a{ss}
Dictionary mapping strings to strings
DBUS_TYPE_G_STRING_STRING_HASHTABLE
GHashTable *
g_hash_table_destroy
Arbitrarily recursive type mappings
Finally, it is possible users will want to write or invoke D-Bus
methods which have arbitrarily complex type signatures not
directly supported by these bindings. For this case, we have a
DBusGValue which acts as a kind of special
variant value which may be iterated over manually. The
GType associated is
DBUS_TYPE_G_VALUE.
TODO insert usage of DBUS_TYPE_G_VALUE here.
A sample program
Here is a D-Bus program using the GLib bindings.
int
main (int argc, char **argv)
{
DBusGConnection *connection;
GError *error;
DBusGProxy *proxy;
char **name_list;
char **name_list_ptr;
g_type_init ();
error = NULL;
connection = dbus_g_bus_get (DBUS_BUS_SESSION,
&error);
if (connection == NULL)
{
g_printerr ("Failed to open connection to bus: %s\n",
error->message);
g_error_free (error);
exit (1);
}
/* Create a proxy object for the "bus driver" (name "org.freedesktop.DBus") */
proxy = dbus_g_proxy_new_for_name (connection,
DBUS_SERVICE_DBUS,
DBUS_PATH_DBUS,
DBUS_INTERFACE_DBUS);
/* Call ListNames method, wait for reply */
error = NULL;
if (!dbus_g_proxy_call (proxy, "ListNames", &error, G_TYPE_INVALID,
G_TYPE_STRV, &name_list, G_TYPE_INVALID))
{
/* Just do demonstrate remote exceptions versus regular GError */
if (error->domain == DBUS_GERROR && error->code == DBUS_GERROR_REMOTE_EXCEPTION)
g_printerr ("Caught remote method exception %s: %s",
dbus_g_error_get_name (error),
error->message);
else
g_printerr ("Error: %s\n", error->message);
g_error_free (error);
exit (1);
}
/* Print the results */
g_print ("Names on the message bus:\n");
for (name_list_ptr = name_list; *name_list_ptr; name_list_ptr++)
{
g_print (" %s\n", *name_list_ptr);
}
g_strfreev (name_list);
g_object_unref (proxy);
return 0;
}
Program initalization
A connection to the bus is acquired using
dbus_g_bus_get. Next, a proxy
is created for the object "/org/freedesktop/DBus" with
interface org.freedesktop.DBus
on the service org.freedesktop.DBus.
This is a proxy for the message bus itself.
Understanding method invocation
You have a number of choices for method invocation. First, as
used above, dbus_g_proxy_call sends a
method call to the remote object, and blocks until a reply is
recieved. The outgoing arguments are specified in the varargs
array, terminated with G_TYPE_INVALID.
Next, pointers to return values are specified, followed again
by G_TYPE_INVALID.
To invoke a method asynchronously, use
dbus_g_proxy_begin_call. This returns a
DBusGPendingCall object; you may then set a
notification function using
dbus_g_pending_call_set_notify.
Connecting to object signals
You may connect to signals using
dbus_g_proxy_add_signal and
dbus_g_proxy_connect_signal. You must
invoke dbus_g_proxy_add_signal to specify
the signature of your signal handlers; you may then invoke
dbus_g_proxy_connect_signal multiple times.
Note that it will often be the case that there is no builtin
marshaller for the type signature of a remote signal. In that
case, you must generate a marshaller yourself by using
glib-genmarshal, and then register
it using dbus_g_object_register_marshaller.
Error handling and remote exceptions
All of the GLib binding methods such as
dbus_g_proxy_end_call return a
GError. This GError can
represent two different things:
An internal D-Bus error, such as an out-of-memory
condition, an I/O error, or a network timeout. Errors
generated by the D-Bus library itself have the domain
DBUS_GERROR, and a corresponding code
such as DBUS_GERROR_NO_MEMORY. It will
not be typical for applications to handle these errors
specifically.
A remote D-Bus exception, thrown by the peer, bus, or
service. D-Bus remote exceptions have both a textual
"name" and a "message". The GLib bindings store this
information in the GError, but some
special rules apply.
The set error will have the domain
DBUS_GERROR as above, and will also
have the code
DBUS_GERROR_REMOTE_EXCEPTION. In order
to access the remote exception name, you must use a
special accessor, such as
dbus_g_error_has_name or
dbus_g_error_get_name. The remote
exception detailed message is accessible via the regular
GError message member.
More examples of method invocation
Sending an integer and string, receiving an array of bytes
GArray *arr;
error = NULL;
if (!dbus_g_proxy_call (proxy, "Foobar", &error,
G_TYPE_INT, 42, G_TYPE_STRING, "hello",
G_TYPE_INVALID,
DBUS_TYPE_G_UCHAR_ARRAY, &arr, G_TYPE_INVALID))
{
/* Handle error */
}
g_assert (arr != NULL);
printf ("got back %u values", arr->len);
Sending a GHashTable
GHashTable *hash = g_hash_table_new (g_str_hash, g_str_equal);
guint32 ret;
g_hash_table_insert (hash, "foo", "bar");
g_hash_table_insert (hash, "baz", "whee");
error = NULL;
if (!dbus_g_proxy_call (proxy, "HashSize", &error,
DBUS_TYPE_G_STRING_STRING_HASH, hash, G_TYPE_INVALID,
G_TYPE_UINT, &ret, G_TYPE_INVALID))
{
/* Handle error */
}
g_assert (ret == 2);
g_hash_table_destroy (hash);
Receiving a boolean and a string
gboolean boolret;
char *strret;
error = NULL;
if (!dbus_g_proxy_call (proxy, "GetStuff", &error,
G_TYPE_INVALID,
G_TYPE_BOOLEAN, &boolret,
G_TYPE_STRING, &strret,
G_TYPE_INVALID))
{
/* Handle error */
}
printf ("%s %s", boolret ? "TRUE" : "FALSE", strret);
g_free (strret);
Sending two arrays of strings
/* NULL terminate */
char *strs_static[] = {"foo", "bar", "baz", NULL};
/* Take pointer to array; cannot pass array directly */
char **strs_static_p = strs_static;
char **strs_dynamic;
strs_dynamic = g_new (char *, 4);
strs_dynamic[0] = g_strdup ("hello");
strs_dynamic[1] = g_strdup ("world");
strs_dynamic[2] = g_strdup ("!");
/* NULL terminate */
strs_dynamic[3] = NULL;
error = NULL;
if (!dbus_g_proxy_call (proxy, "TwoStrArrays", &error,
G_TYPE_STRV, strs_static_p,
G_TYPE_STRV, strs_dynamic,
G_TYPE_INVALID,
G_TYPE_INVALID))
{
/* Handle error */
}
g_strfreev (strs_dynamic);
Sending a boolean, receiving an array of strings
char **strs;
char **strs_p;
gboolean blah;
error = NULL;
blah = TRUE;
if (!dbus_g_proxy_call (proxy, "GetStrs", &error,
G_TYPE_BOOLEAN, blah,
G_TYPE_INVALID,
G_TYPE_STRV, &strs,
G_TYPE_INVALID))
{
/* Handle error */
}
for (strs_p = strs; *strs_p; strs_p++)
printf ("got string: \"%s\"", *strs_p);
g_strfreev (strs);
Sending a variant
GValue val = {0, };
g_value_init (&val, G_TYPE_STRING);
g_value_set_string (&val, "hello world");
error = NULL;
if (!dbus_g_proxy_call (proxy, "SendVariant", &error,
G_TYPE_VALUE, &val, G_TYPE_INVALID,
G_TYPE_INVALID))
{
/* Handle error */
}
g_assert (ret == 2);
g_value_unset (&val);
Receiving a variant
GValue val = {0, };
error = NULL;
if (!dbus_g_proxy_call (proxy, "GetVariant", &error, G_TYPE_INVALID,
G_TYPE_VALUE, &val, G_TYPE_INVALID))
{
/* Handle error */
}
if (G_VALUE_TYPE (&val) == G_TYPE_STRING)
printf ("%s\n", g_value_get_string (&val));
else if (G_VALUE_TYPE (&val) == G_TYPE_INT)
printf ("%d\n", g_value_get_int (&val));
else
...
g_value_unset (&val);
Generated Bindings
By using the Introspection XML files, convenient client-side bindings
can be automatically created to ease the use of a remote DBus object.
Here is a sample XML file which describes an object that exposes
one method, named ManyArgs.
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>
<node name="/com/example/MyObject">
<interface name="com.example.MyObject">
<method name="ManyArgs">
<arg type="u" name="x" direction="in" />
<arg type="s" name="str" direction="in" />
<arg type="d" name="trouble" direction="in" />
<arg type="d" name="d_ret" direction="out" />
<arg type="s" name="str_ret" direction="out" />
</method>
</interface>
</node>
Run dbus-binding-tool --mode=glib-client
FILENAME >
HEADER_NAME to generate the header
file. For example: dbus-binding-tool --mode=glib-client
my-object.xml > my-object-bindings.h. This will generate
inline functions with the following prototypes:
/* This is a blocking call */
gboolean
com_example_MyObject_many_args (DBusGProxy *proxy, const guint IN_x,
const char * IN_str, const gdouble IN_trouble,
gdouble* OUT_d_ret, char ** OUT_str_ret,
GError **error);
/* This is a non-blocking call */
DBusGProxyCall*
com_example_MyObject_many_args_async (DBusGProxy *proxy, const guint IN_x,
const char * IN_str, const gdouble IN_trouble,
com_example_MyObject_many_args_reply callback,
gpointer userdata);
/* This is the typedef for the non-blocking callback */
typedef void
(*com_example_MyObject_many_args_reply)
(DBusGProxy *proxy, gdouble OUT_d_ret, char * OUT_str_ret,
GError *error, gpointer userdata);
The first argument in all functions is a DBusGProxy
*, which you should create with the usual
dbus_g_proxy_new_* functions. Following that are the
"in" arguments, and then either the "out" arguments and a
GError * for the synchronous (blocking) function, or
callback and user data arguments for the asynchronous (non-blocking)
function. The callback in the asynchronous function passes the
DBusGProxy *, the returned "out" arguments, an
GError * which is set if there was an error otherwise
NULL, and the user data.
As with the server-side bindings support (see ), the exact behaviour of the client-side
bindings can be manipulated using "annotations". Currently the only
annotation used by the client bindings is
org.freedesktop.DBus.GLib.NoReply, which sets the
flag indicating that the client isn't expecting a reply to the method
call, so a reply shouldn't be sent. This is often used to speed up
rapid method calls where there are no "out" arguments, and not knowing
if the method succeeded is an acceptable compromise to half the traffic
on the bus.
GLib API: Implementing Objects
At the moment, to expose a GObject via D-Bus, you must
write XML by hand which describes the methods exported
by the object. In the future, this manual step will
be obviated by the upcoming GLib introspection support.
Here is a sample XML file which describes an object that exposes
one method, named ManyArgs.
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>
<node name="/com/example/MyObject">
<interface name="com.example.MyObject">
<annotation name="org.freedesktop.DBus.GLib.CSymbol" value="my_object"/>
<method name="ManyArgs">
<!-- This is optional, and in this case is redunundant -->
<annotation name="org.freedesktop.DBus.GLib.CSymbol" value="my_object_many_args"/>
<arg type="u" name="x" direction="in" />
<arg type="s" name="str" direction="in" />
<arg type="d" name="trouble" direction="in" />
<arg type="d" name="d_ret" direction="out" />
<arg type="s" name="str_ret" direction="out" />
</method>
</interface>
</node>
This XML is in the same format as the D-Bus introspection XML
format. Except we must include an "annotation" which give the C
symbols corresponding to the object implementation prefix
(my_object). In addition, if particular
methods symbol names deviate from C convention
(i.e. ManyArgs ->
many_args), you may specify an annotation
giving the C symbol.
Once you have written this XML, run dbus-binding-tool --mode=glib-server FILENAME > HEADER_NAME. to
generate a header file. For example: dbus-binding-tool --mode=glib-server my-object.xml > my-object-glue.h.
Next, include the generated header in your program, and invoke
dbus_g_object_class_install_info in the class
initializer, passing the object class and "object info" included in the
header. For example:
dbus_g_object_type_install_info (COM_FOO_TYPE_MY_OBJECT, &com_foo_my_object_info);
This should be done exactly once per object class.
To actually implement the method, just define a C function named e.g.
my_object_many_args in the same file as the info
header is included. At the moment, it is required that this function
conform to the following rules:
The function must return a value of type gboolean;
TRUE on success, and FALSE
otherwise.
The first parameter is a pointer to an instance of the object.
Following the object instance pointer are the method
input values.
Following the input values are pointers to return values.
The final parameter must be a GError **.
If the function returns FALSE for an
error, the error parameter must be initalized with
g_set_error.
Finally, you can export an object using dbus_g_connection_register_g_object. For example:
dbus_g_connection_register_g_object (connection,
"/com/foo/MyObject",
obj);
Server-side Annotations
There are several annotations that are used when generating the
server-side bindings. The most common annotation is
org.freedesktop.DBus.GLib.CSymbol but there are other
annotations which are often useful.
org.freedesktop.DBus.GLib.CSymbol
This annotation is used to specify the C symbol names for
the various types (interface, method, etc), if it differs from the
name DBus generates.
org.freedesktop.DBus.GLib.Async
This annotation marks the method implementation as an
asynchronous function, which doesn't return a response straight
away but will send the response at some later point to complete
the call. This is used to implement non-blocking services where
method calls can take time.
When a method is asynchronous, the function prototype is
different. It is required that the function conform to the
following rules:
The function must return a value of type gboolean;
TRUE on success, and FALSE
otherwise. TODO: the return value is currently ignored.
The first parameter is a pointer to an instance of the object.
Following the object instance pointer are the method
input values.
The final parameter must be a
DBusGMethodInvocation *. This is used
when sending the response message back to the client, by
calling dbus_g_method_return or
dbus_g_method_return_error.
org.freedesktop.DBus.GLib.Const
This attribute can only be applied to "out"
<arg> nodes, and specifies that the
parameter isn't being copied when returned. For example, this
turns a 's' argument from a char ** to a
const char **, and results in the argument not
being freed by DBus after the message is sent.
org.freedesktop.DBus.GLib.ReturnVal
This attribute can only be applied to "out"
<arg> nodes, and alters the expected
function signature. It currently can be set to two values:
"" or "error". The
argument marked with this attribute is not returned via a
pointer argument, but by the function's return value. If the
attribute's value is the empty string, the GError
* argument is also omitted so there is no standard way
to return an error value. This is very useful for interfacing
with existing code, as it is possible to match existing APIs.
If the attribute's value is "error", then the
final argument is a GError * as usual.
Some examples to demonstrate the usage. This introspection XML:
<method name="Increment">
<arg type="u" name="x" />
<arg type="u" direction="out" />
</method>
Expects the following function declaration:
gboolean
my_object_increment (MyObject *obj, gint32 x, gint32 *ret, GError **error);
This introspection XML:
<method name="IncrementRetval">
<arg type="u" name="x" />
<arg type="u" direction="out" >
<annotation name="org.freedesktop.DBus.GLib.ReturnVal" value=""/>
</arg>
</method>
Expects the following function declaration:
gint32
my_object_increment_retval (MyObject *obj, gint32 x)
This introspection XML:
<method name="IncrementRetvalError">
<arg type="u" name="x" />
<arg type="u" direction="out" >
<annotation name="org.freedesktop.DBus.GLib.ReturnVal" value="error"/>
</arg>
</method>
Expects the following function declaration:
gint32
my_object_increment_retval_error (MyObject *obj, gint32 x, GError **error)
Python API
The Python API, dbus-python, is now documented separately in
the dbus-python tutorial (also available in doc/tutorial.txt,
and doc/tutorial.html if built with python-docutils, in the dbus-python
source distribution).
Qt API: Using Remote Objects
The Qt bindings are not yet documented.
Qt API: Implementing Objects
The Qt bindings are not yet documented.