Is get_result() a required call for put_async() in Google App Engine

Question

With the new release of GAE 1.5.0, we now have an easy way to do async datastore calls. Are we required to call get_result() after calling 'put_async'?

For example, if I have an model called MyLogData, can I just call:

put_async(MyLogData(text="My Text"))

right before my handler returns without calling the matching get_result()? Does GAE automatically block on any pending calls before sending the result to the client?

Note that I don't really care to handle error conditions. i.e. I don't mind if some of these puts fail.

Answer 1

I don't think there is any sure way to know if get_result() is required unless someone on the GAE team verifies this, but I think it's not needed. Here is how I tested it.

I wrote a simple handler:

class DB_TempTestModel(db.Model):
    data = db.BlobProperty()

class MyHandler(webapp.RequestHandler):
    def get(self):
        starttime = datetime.datetime.now()
        lots_of_data = ' '*500000
        if self.request.get('a') == '1':
            db.put(DB_TempTestModel(data=lots_of_data))
            db.put(DB_TempTestModel(data=lots_of_data))
            db.put(DB_TempTestModel(data=lots_of_data))
            db.put(DB_TempTestModel(data=lots_of_data))
        if self.request.get('a') == '2':
            db.put_async(DB_TempTestModel(data=lots_of_data))
            db.put_async(DB_TempTestModel(data=lots_of_data))
            db.put_async(DB_TempTestModel(data=lots_of_data))
            db.put_async(DB_TempTestModel(data=lots_of_data))
        self.response.out.write(str(datetime.datetime.now()-starttime))

I ran it a bunch of times on a High Replication Application.

The data was always there, making me believe that unless there is a failure in the datastore side of things (unlikely), it's gonna be written.

Here's the interesting part. When the data is written with put_async() (?a=2), the amount of time (to process the request) was on average about 2 to 3 times as fast as put()(?a=1) (not a very scientific test - just eyeballing it).

But the cpu_ms and api_cpu_ms were the same for both ?a=1 and ?a=2.

From the logs:

ms=440 cpu_ms=627 api_cpu_ms=580 cpm_usd=0.036244

vs

ms=149 cpu_ms=627 api_cpu_ms=580 cpm_usd=0.036244

On the client side, looking at the network latency of the requests, it showed the same results, i.e. `?a=2' requests were at least 2 times faster. Definitely a win on the client side... but it seems to not have any gain on the server side.

Anyone on the GAE team care to comment?