Intro to XPC inter-process communication

This presentation gives basic understanding how XPC works on macOS and how to establish it.

Transcript

1. XPC Connection
   

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2. XPC
   currently the only non-deprecated
   inter-process communication API on macOS
   

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3. XPC services
   XPC connection
   

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4. We are NOT talking about XPC Services here.
   We are talking XPC as API fo inter-process
   communication
   

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5. XPC benefits
   1. Performance: lazy (on-demand) automatic launching XPC services
   
   2. Architecture: one executable can represent several services
   
   3. Security: making services with minimum privileges
   
   4. Stability: crashing one process doesn't affect another
   

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6. Adding an executable, that
   can be called via XPC
   1. Copy configuration plist to appropriate system location*
   2. Change plist owner to root
   3. Add plist to lauchd (load or bootstrap)
   4. Put service's executable to location, defined in configuration plist
   5. Run client!
   *System locations
   
   — user agent for current user: ~/Library/LaunchAgents/
   
   — user agent for all users: /Library/LaunchAgents/
   
   — daemon: /Library/LaunchDaemons/
   

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7. Daemon config plist
   example
   

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8. libxpc API
   xpc.h and connection.h
   

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9. libxpc API
   xpc.h and connection.h
   

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10. NSXPCConnection
    1. NSXPCConnection
    
    2. NSXPCInterface
    
    3. NSXPCListener
    
    4. NSXPCListenerEndpoint
    

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11. NSXPCConnection
    1. NSXPCConnection
    
    2. NSXPCInterface
    
    3. NSXPCListener
    
    4. NSXPCListenerEndpoint optional
    

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13. Establishing XPC
    connection
    Details: https://developer.apple.com/library/archive/documentation/MacOSX/Conceptual/BPSystemStartup/
    Chapters/CreatingXPCServices.html
    Client side
    call on the
    server side
    

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14. Establishing XPC
    connection
    Details: https://developer.apple.com/library/archive/documentation/MacOSX/Conceptual/BPSystemStartup/
    Chapters/CreatingXPCServices.html
    Server side
    Instantiate your listener soon after launch:
    set it's delegate
    

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15. Establishing XPC
    connection
    Server side
    In NSXPCListener's delegate method set up the connection:
    

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16. invalidation handler
    interruption handler
    

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17. invalidation handler
    interruption handler
    error →
    

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18. invalidation handler
    interruption handler
    error →
    OK →
    

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19. Error output goes to
    Console.app
    

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20. Method signature
    restrictions for XPC calls
    Methods should return Void.
    Parameters could be:
    1. Arithmetic types (int, char, float, double, uint64_t, NSUInteger, and so on)
    2. BOOL
    3. C strings
    4. C structures and arrays containing only the types listed above
    5. Objective-C classes, that implement the NSSecureCoding protocol (e.g. NSString or custom
    classes).
    6. NSArray, NSDictionary and other collections with objects, conforming to NSSecureCoding.
    7. Only one block (reply block), that returns Void and receives parameters of types, listed above.
    

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21. Passing objects
    by copy and by proxy
    Passing by copy is a recommended and performant way.
    Passing by proxy decreases performance and should be avoided.
    

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22. Thank you!
    Happy to help via julia.vashchenko@yahoo.com
    

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