source: trunk/doc/src/network-programming/bearermanagement.qdoc@ 1036

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/*!
\page bearer-management.html

\title Bearer Management
\ingroup qt-network
\brief An API to control the system's connectivity state.

Bearer Management controls the connectivity state of the system so that
the user can start or stop interfaces or roam transparently between
access points.

\tableofcontents


\section1 Overview

The Bearer Management API controls the system's connectivity state. This
incorporates simple information such as whether the device is online and
how many interfaces there are as well as enables the application developer
to start, stop network interfaces and influences other connection specific
details. Depending on the platform's capabilities it may even provide
session management so that a network interface remains up for as long as
clients have a registered interest in them while at the same time
optimizes the interface's uptime.

This API does not provide support for management of network configurations
themselves. It is up to the platform to provide infrastructure which
enables to user to create, edit or delete network configurations.

\section2 The API in Detail

Computer systems manage their network interfaces via a set of configurations.
Each configuration describes a set of parameters which instruct the system
how a particular network interface is started. One of the most simplistic
examples might be an Ethernet configuration that links a network card to a
DHCP server. A more complex example might be a Wireless LAN configuration
which may comprise of hardware details such as the WLAN card address,
WLAN access point details (e.g ESSID, encryption details) and user specific
information (for example username and password). Once the network interface
was configured and started according to the configuration blue print,
multiple applications are free to use this link layer connection/session
for their own socket operations. Note that the QNetworkConfiguration object
only provides limited information about the configuration details themselves.
It's main purpose is to act as a configuration identifier through which link
layer connections can be created, destroyed and monitored.

QNetworkSession provides two types of use cases. It enables the monitoring of
physical network interfaces and management of network sessions. Network sessions
are a common feature on mobile devices where multiple applications
can request network sessions as they see fit. The system consolidates and tracks
active network sessions for the same network interface by maintaining the link
layer connections until the last session has been closed. The subsequent table
lists the major QNetworkSession functions and how they fit into the session and
hardware management categories:

\table 60%
\header \o Interface management             \o Session management
\row    \o QNetworkSession::stop()          \o QNetworkSession::open()
\row    \o QNetworkSession::interface()     \o QNetworkSession::close()
\row    \o QNetworkSession::state()         \o QNetworkSession::isOpen()
\row    \o QNetworkSession::bytesWritten()  \o QNetworkSession::migrate()
\row    \o QNetworkSession::bytesReceived() \o QNetworkSession::ignore()
\row    \o QNetworkSession::activeTime()    \o QNetworkSession::accept()
\row    \o QNetworkSession::stateChanged()  \o QNetworkSession::reject()
\row    \o                                  \o QNetworkSession::opened()
\row    \o                                  \o QNetworkSession::closed()
\endtable

The state of the session represents the state of the underlying access point
whereas the session's openness implies the networking/connectivity state available
to the current process.

Possible use cases for interface management are network management related
applications which intend to monitor the connectivity state but do not engage
in network communication themselves. Any application wanting to open a socket
to a remote address will typically use session management related functionality.

\section3 Service networks

Some mobile platforms use the concept of grouped access points (also
called SNAP or Service Network Access Point). In principle multiple
configurations are grouped together and possibly even prioritized when
compared to each other. This is useful for use cases where all
configurations serve a similar purpose or context. A common context could
be that they provide access to the public Internet or possibly only to the
office Intranet. By providing a pool of configurations the system can make
a decision based on given priorities which usually map to factors such as
speed, availability and cost. Furthermore the system can automatically
roam from one access point to the next one while ensuring minimal impact on
the user experience.

The \l{QNetworkConfiguration::Type} flag specifies to what category a
configuration belongs. The \l{QNetworkConfiguration::InternetAccessPoint}
type is the most common example. It represents a configuration that can be
used to create a session. The above mentioned grouping behavior is provided
by \l {QNetworkConfiguration::ServiceNetwork} configurations. Service
networks are place holders until such time when the user attempts to
\l {QNetworkSession::open()}{open()} a new session. At that point in time
the system determines which of the configurations \l{QNetworkConfiguration::children()}
is best to use. The selection algorithm is provided by the platform and is usually managed
by network settings applications. A service network can only have one level of indirection
which implies children can only be of type \l {QNetworkConfiguration::InternetAccessPoint}.

Most systems allow the user to define the systems default configuration.
Usually the default behavior is either a service network, a particular
Internet access point or the user instructs the platform to ask the user
once an application requests the network. User interaction is generally
implemented by some sort of system dialog which shows up at the appropriate
point in time. The application does not have to handle the user input. This
API provides the \l QNetworkConfigurationManager::defaultConfiguration()
call which serves a similar purpose. The subsequent code snippet provides
a quick way how an application can quickly create a new network session
without (or only minimal) user interaction:

\code
    // Set Internet Access Point
    QNetworkConfigurationManager manager;
    const bool canStartIAP = (manager.capabilities()
                              & QNetworkConfigurationManager::CanStartAndStopInterfaces);
    // Is there default access point, use it
    QNetworkConfiguration cfg = manager.defaultConfiguration();
    if (!cfg.isValid() || (!canStartIAP && cfg.state() != QNetworkConfiguration::Active)) {
        QMessageBox::information(this, tr("Network"), tr(
                                     "No Access Point found."));
        return;
    }

    session = new QNetworkSession(cfg, this);
    session->open();
    session->waitForOpened(-1);
\endcode

To accommodate the "Ask user" use case the default configuration can be of
type QNetworkConfiguration::UserChoice. A user choice configuration is
resolved as part of the \l {QNetworkSession::open()} call. Note that a
\l{QNetworkConfiguration::UserChoice}{UserChoice} configuration is only
ever returned via \l {QNetworkConfigurationManager::defaultConfiguration()}
and not \l QNetworkConfigurationManager::allConfigurations().

On systems which do not maintain a list of
\l {QNetworkConfigurationManager::defaultConfiguration()}{defaultConfiguration()}
an invalid configuration is returned. A possible workaround could be to
implement a custom dialog which is populated based on what
\l QNetworkConfigurationManager::allConfigurations() returns.

\section3 Managing network sessions

A QNetworkSession object separates a \l {QNetworkSession::state()}{state()}
and an \l{QNetworkSession::isOpen()}{isOpen()} condition.

The state() attribute enables developers to detect whether the system
currently maintains a global network session for the given
QNetworkConfiguration. If \l {QNetworkSession::isOpen()}{isOpen()}
returns true the QNetworkSession instance at hand was at least one of the
entities requesting the global network session. This distinction is
required to support the notion of session registrations. For as long as
there are one or more open QNetworkSession instances the underlying
network interface is not shut down. Therefore the session
\l{QNetworkSession::state()}{state()} can be used to monitor the state of
network interfaces.

An open session is created by calling \l {QNetworkSession::open()} and
closed via \l{QNetworkSession::close()}, respectively. If the session
is \l{QNetworkSession::Disconnected}{disconnected} at the time of the
\l{QNetworkSession::open()}{open()} call the underlying interface is started;
otherwise only the reference counter against the global session is
incremented. The opposite behavior can be observed when using
\l{QNetworkSession::close()}{close()}.

In some use cases it may be necessary to turn the interface off despite of
open sessions. This can be achieved by calling
\l{QNetworkSession::stop()}{stop()}. An example use case could be a
network manager type of application allowing the user to control the
overall state of the devices connectivity.

Global (inter-process) session support is platform dependent and can be
detected via \l {QNetworkConfigurationManager::SystemSessionSupport}.
If the system does not support global session calling
\l{QNetworkSession::close()}{close()} never stops the interface.

\section3 Roaming

Roaming is the process of reconnecting a device from one network to another
while minimizing the impact on the application. The system notifies the application
about link layer changes so that the required preparation can be taken.
The most common reaction would be to reinitialize sockets and to renegotiate
stateful connections with other parties. In the most extreme cases applications
may even prevent the roaming altogether.

Roaming is initiated when the system determines that a more appropriate access point
becomes available to the user. In general such a decision is based on cost, network speed
or network type (access to certain private networks may only be provided via certain access points).
Almost all devices providing roaming support have some form of global configuration application
enabling the user to define such groups of access points (service networks) and priorities.

This API supports two types of roaming. Application level roaming (ALR)
provides the most control over the process. Applications will be notified about upcoming
link layer changes and get the opportunity to test the new access point. Eventually they can
reject or accept the link layer change. The second form of roaming is referred to as Forced Roaming.
The system simply changes the link layer without consulting the application. It is up to
the application to detect that some of its internal socket may have become invalid. As a consequence
it has to reinitialize those sockets and reestablish the previous user session without
any interruption. Forced roaming has the advantage that applications don't have to
manage the entire roaming process by themselves.

QNetworkSession is the central class for managing roaming related issues.

\section3 Platform capabilities

Some API features are not available on all platforms. The
\l QNetworkConfigurationManager::Capability should be used to detect
platform features at runtime. The following table lists the various
platform APIs being used by this API. This may assist in the process of
determining the feature support:

\table
    \header
    \o Platform
    \o Backend capabilities
    \row
        \o Linux\unicode{0xAE}
        \o Linux uses the \l {http://projects.gnome.org/NetworkManager}{NetworkManager API} which supports interface notifications and starting and stopping of network interfaces.
    \row
        \o Windows\unicode{0xAE} XP
        \o This platform supports interface notifications without active polling.
    \row
        \o Windows XP SP2+Hotfixes, Windows XP SP3, Windows Vista, Windows 7
        \o In addition to standard Windows XP wifi access point monitoring has been improved which includes the ability to start and stop wifi interfaces. This requires Windows to manage the wifi interfaces.
    \row
        \o Symbian\unicode{0xAE}  Platform & S60 3.1
        \o Symbian support is based on Symbian platforms RConnection. In addition to interface notifications, starting and stopping of network it provides system wide session support and direct connection routing.
    \row
        \o Symbian Platform & S60 3.2+
        \o This platform enjoys the most comprehensive feature set. In addition to the features support by the S60 3.1 Network roaming is supported.
    \row
        \o Mac OS\unicode{0xAE}
        \o This platform has full support by way of CoreWLAN offered in Mac OS 10.6. Previous
           versions of Mac OS - 10.5 and 10.4 have limited support.
    \row
        \o All other platforms (*nix, Windows Mobile)
        \o This backend is the fallback for all platforms supports network interface notifications via active polling only.
\endtable

*/