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As we had known, If we want to use traditional IO to construct server, it must block somewhere, so we had to use loop or one thread one socket mode, So nio seem it is better choice. So I want know if the nio is better choice forever?
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Java NIO enables you to do non-blocking IO. For instance, a thread can ask a channel to read data into a buffer. While the channel reads data into the buffer, the thread can do something else. Once data is read into the buffer, the thread can then continue processing it.
Java IO's various streams are blocking. It means when the thread invoke a write() or read(), then the thread is blocked until there is some data available for read, or the data is fully written. Non blocking IO does not wait for the data to be read or write before returning.
nio (NIO stands for non-blocking I/O) is a collection of Java programming language APIs that offer features for intensive I/O operations. It was introduced with the J2SE 1.4 release of Java by Sun Microsystems to complement an existing standard I/O.
Java NIO is considered to be faster than regular IO because: Java NIO supports non-blocking mode. Non-blocking IO is faster than blocking IO because it does not require a dedicated thread per connection.
IMHO, Blocking IO is generally the simplest to use, and unless you have a specific requirement which demands more from your system, you should stick with simplest option.
The next simplest option is blocking NIO, which I often prefer if I want something more efficiency or control than IO. It is still relatively simple but allows you to use ByteBuffers. e.g. ByteBuffers support little endian.
A common option is to use non-blocking NIO with Selectors. Much of the complexity this introduces can be handled by frameworks such as Netty or Mina. I suggest you use such a library if you need non-blocking IO e.g. because you have thousands of concurrent connections per server. IMHO You have thousands of connections, you should consider having more servers unless what each connection does is pretty trivial. AFAIK google go for more servers rather thousands of users per server.
The more extreme option is to use NIO2. This is even more complex and lengthy it write than non-blocking NIO. I don't know of any frameworks which support this well. i.e. it is actually faster when you do. AFAIK It appears this is worth using if you have Infiniband (which is what it was designed to support) but perhaps not worth using if you have Ethernet.
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If you want non-blocking IO, NIO is not the better choice—it's the only choice in Java. Keep in mind that people still use the old IO regularly because it is way simpler to code against. NIO API is quite raw and is more of an enabling low-level technology than a client-side API. I suggest using NIO through an API that provides a simpler interface to the problems you want to solve using non-blocking IO.
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