ruby-core

Issue #21311 has been updated by Eregon (Benoit Daloze).


bughit (bug hit) wrote in #note-112:
> Yes, it would only help with direct dependencies of the app:

Right, I also thought about this case.
That would work with the big compromise of every usage of `[email protected]` to be through `ns_d2::D` and not `D` (which would be `[email protected]`).

> But not for transitive, which is probably the more common type of conflict. 

Yep, that would be the main value of this, if 2 gems have a dependency on a third gem but their version requirements are incompatible.
Without that, there is basically no value to be able to load 2 versions of a gems for an app.

---

That means, that AFAIK the only valid remaining motivation/goal of this feature is the "run multiple apps in a single process".
And using one process per app (through forking or not) seems clearly better because that runs in parallel, does not use more memory (or insignificant differences), has proper isolation and has separate heaps so parallel GC.
As a result running these apps in production would use separate processes anyway for these huge advantages, and running in development in a single process wouldn't be representative and cause many unnecessary differences.

The only advantages I saw so far, e.g. in https://bugs.ruby-lang.org/issues/21311#note-86:
* operational simplicity of managing one process vs many: one can have a master process that automatically handles that, it's some amount of logic but only needs to be written once and could be a gem. Puma already does this for example.
* isolated tests: it wouldn't work for some tests which e.g. have process-global state, for other tests `fork` seems more efficient, safer, uses less memory and starts faster because no need to load all files again.

In short: I think there are **no use cases for this feature** (doing these use cases with e.g. fork/multiple processes is simply better), and I think it was premature to merge it.
The fact that bugs for this feature are [piling up](https://bugs.ruby-lang.org/projects/ruby-master/issues?values[issue_tags][]=namespace) but as far as I can see are not getting addressed feels like the feature is already starting to be abandoned.
A bit like Ractor when it was introduced (and Ractor is finally after many years getting more attention and getting more stable).

I think there could be the use cases of subinterpreters, but that's a different implementation which notably enables parallelism, parallel GC, much better isolation, etc.

----------------------------------------
Feature #21311: Namespace on read (revised)
https://bugs.ruby-lang.org/issues/21311#change-113623

* Author: tagomoris (Satoshi Tagomori)
* Status: Assigned
* Assignee: tagomoris (Satoshi Tagomori)
* Target version: 3.5
----------------------------------------
This replaces #19744 

## Concept

This proposes a new feature to define virtual top-level namespaces in Ruby. Those namespaces can require/load libraries (either .rb or native extension) separately from other namespaces. Dependencies of required/loaded libraries are also required/loaded in the namespace.

This feature will be disabled by default at first, and will be enabled by an env variable `RUBY_NAMESPACE=1` as an experimental feature.
(It could be enabled by default in the future possibly.)

### "on read" approach

The "on write" approach here is the design to define namespaces on the loaded side. For example, Java packages are defined in the .java files and it is required to separate namespaces from each other. It can be implemented very easily, but it requires all libraries to be updated with the package declaration. (In my opinion, it's almost impossible in the Ruby ecosystem.)

The "on read" approach is to create namespaces and then require/load applications and libraries in them. Programmers can control namespace separation at the "read" time. So, we can introduce the namespace separation incrementally.

## Motivation

The "namespace on read" can solve the 2 problems below, and can make a path to solve another problem:

* Avoiding name conflicts between libraries
  * Applications can require two different libraries safely which use the same module name.
* Avoiding unexpected globally shared modules/objects
  * Applications can make an independent/unshared module instance.
* Multiple versions of gems can be required
  * Application developers will have fewer version conflicts between gem dependencies if rubygems/bundler will support the namespace on read. (Support from RubyGems/Bundler and/or other packaging systems will be needed)

For the motivation details, see [Feature #19744].

## How we can use Namespace

```ruby
# app1.rb
PORT = 2048
class App
  def self.port = ::PORT
  def val = PORT.to_s
end

p App.port # 2048

# app2.rb
class Number
  def double = self * 2
end

PORT = 2048.double
class App
  def self.port = ::PORT
  def val = PORT.double.to_s
end

p App.port # 4096

# main.rb - executed as `ruby main.rb`
ns1 = Namespace.new
ns1.require('./app1') # 2048
ns2 = Namespace.new
ns2.require('./app2') # 4096

PORT = 8080
class App
  def self.port = ::PORT
  def val = PORT.to_s
end

p App.port # 8080
p App.new.val # "8080"

p ns1::App.port # 2048
p ns1::App.new.val # "2048"

p ns2::App.port # 4096
p ns2::App.new.val # "8192"

1.double # NoMethodError
```

## Namespace specification

### Types of namespaces

There are two namespace types, "root" and "user" namespace. "Root" namespace exists solely in a Ruby process, and "user" namespaces can be created as many as Ruby programmers want.

### Root namespace

Root namespace is a unique namespace to be defined when a Ruby process starts. It only contains built-in classes/modules/constants, which are available without any `require` calls, including RubyGems itself (when `--disable-gems` is not specified).

At here, "builtin" classes/modules are classes/modules accessible when users' script evaluation starts, without any require/load calls.

### User namespace

User namespace is a namespace to run users' Ruby scripts. The "main" namespace is the namespace to run the user's `.rb` script specified by the `ruby` command-line argument. Other user namespaces ("optional" namespaces) can be created by `Namespace.new` call.

In user namespace (both main and optional namespaces), built-in class/module definitions are copied from the root namespace, and other new classes/modules are defined in the namespace, separately from other (root/user) namespaces.
The newly defined classes/modules are top-level classes/modules in the main namespace like `App`, but in optional namespaces, classes/modules are defined under the namespace (subclass of Module), like `ns::App`.

In that namespace `ns`, `ns::App` is accessible as `App` (or `::App`). There is no way to access `App` in the main namespace from the code in the different namespace `ns`.

### Constants, class variables and global variables

Constants, Class variables of built-in classes and global variables are also separated by namespace. Values set to class/global variables in a namespace are invisible in other namespaces.

### Methods and procs

Methods defined in a namespace run with the defined namespace, even when called from other namespaces.
Procs created in a namespace run with the defined namespace too.

### Dynamic link libraries

Dynamic link libraries (typically .so files) are also loaded in namespaces as well as .rb files.

### Open class (Changes on built-in classes)

In user namespaces, built-in class definitions can be modified. But those operations are processed as copy-on-write of class definition from the root namespace, and the changed definitions are visible only in the (user) namespace.

Definitions in the root namespace are not modifiable from other namespaces. Methods defined in the root namespace run only with root-namespace definitions.

## Enabling Namespace

Specify `RUBY_NAMESPACE=1` environment variable when starting Ruby processes. `1` is the only valid value here.

Namespace feature can be enabled only when Ruby processes start. Setting `RUBY_NAMESPACE=1` after starting Ruby scripts performs nothing.

## Pull-request

https://github.com/ruby/ruby/pull/13226






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