Task.Yield() in library needs ConfigureWait(false)

Question

It's recommended that one use ConfigureAwait(false) whenever when you can, especially in libraries because it can help avoid deadlocks and improve performance.

I have written a library that makes heavy use of async (accesses web services for a DB). The users of the library were getting a deadlock and after much painful debugging and tinkering I tracked it down to the single use of await Task.Yield(). Everywhere else that I have an await, I use .ConfigureAwait(false), however that is not supported on Task.Yield().

What is the recommended solution for situations where one needs the equivalent of Task.Yield().ConfigureAwait(false)?

I've read about how there was a SwitchTo method that was removed. I can see why that could be dangerous, but why is there no equivalent of Task.Yield().ConfigureAwait(false)?

Edit:

To provide further context for my question, here is some code. I am implementing an open source library for accessing DynamoDB (a distributed database as a service from AWS) that supports async. A number of operations return IAsyncEnumerable<T> as provided by the IX-Async library. That library doesn't provide a good way of generating async enumerables from data sources that provide rows in "chunks" i.e. each async request returns many items. So I have my own generic type for this. The library supports a read ahead option allowing the user to specify how much data should be requested ahead of when it is actually needed by a call to MoveNext().

Basically, how this works is that I make requests for chunks by calling GetMore() and passing along state between these. I put those tasks in a chunks queue and dequeue them and turn them into actual results that I put in a separate queue. The NextChunk() method is the issue here. Depending on the value of ReadAhead I will keeping getting the next chunk as soon as the last one is done (All) or not until a value is needed but not available (None) or only get the next chunk beyond the values that are currently being used (Some). Because of that, getting the next chunk should run in parallel/not block getting the next value. The enumerator code for this is:

private class ChunkedAsyncEnumerator<TState, TResult> : IAsyncEnumerator<TResult>
{
    private readonly ChunkedAsyncEnumerable<TState, TResult> enumerable;
    private readonly ConcurrentQueue<Task<TState>> chunks = new ConcurrentQueue<Task<TState>>();
    private readonly Queue<TResult> results = new Queue<TResult>();
    private CancellationTokenSource cts = new CancellationTokenSource();
    private TState lastState;
    private TResult current;
    private bool complete; // whether we have reached the end

    public ChunkedAsyncEnumerator(ChunkedAsyncEnumerable<TState, TResult> enumerable, TState initialState)
    {
        this.enumerable = enumerable;
        lastState = initialState;
        if(enumerable.ReadAhead != ReadAhead.None)
            chunks.Enqueue(NextChunk(initialState));
    }

    private async Task<TState> NextChunk(TState state, CancellationToken? cancellationToken = null)
    {
        await Task.Yield(); // ** causes deadlock
        var nextState = await enumerable.GetMore(state, cancellationToken ?? cts.Token).ConfigureAwait(false);
        if(enumerable.ReadAhead == ReadAhead.All && !enumerable.IsComplete(nextState))
            chunks.Enqueue(NextChunk(nextState)); // This is a read ahead, so it shouldn't be tied to our token

        return nextState;
    }

    public Task<bool> MoveNext(CancellationToken cancellationToken)
    {
        cancellationToken.ThrowIfCancellationRequested();

        if(results.Count > 0)
        {
            current = results.Dequeue();
            return TaskConstants.True;
        }
        return complete ? TaskConstants.False : MoveNextAsync(cancellationToken);
    }

    private async Task<bool> MoveNextAsync(CancellationToken cancellationToken)
    {
        Task<TState> nextStateTask;
        if(chunks.TryDequeue(out nextStateTask))
            lastState = await nextStateTask.WithCancellation(cancellationToken).ConfigureAwait(false);
        else
            lastState = await NextChunk(lastState, cancellationToken).ConfigureAwait(false);

        complete = enumerable.IsComplete(lastState);
        foreach(var result in enumerable.GetResults(lastState))
            results.Enqueue(result);

        if(!complete && enumerable.ReadAhead == ReadAhead.Some)
            chunks.Enqueue(NextChunk(lastState)); // This is a read ahead, so it shouldn't be tied to our token

        return await MoveNext(cancellationToken).ConfigureAwait(false);
    }

    public TResult Current { get { return current; } }

    // Dispose() implementation omitted
}

I make no claim this code is perfect. Sorry it is so long, wasn't sure how to simplify. The important part is the NextChunk method and the call to Task.Yield(). This functionality is used through a static construction method:

internal static class AsyncEnumerableEx
{
    public static IAsyncEnumerable<TResult> GenerateChunked<TState, TResult>(
        TState initialState,
        Func<TState, CancellationToken, Task<TState>> getMore,
        Func<TState, IEnumerable<TResult>> getResults,
        Func<TState, bool> isComplete,
        ReadAhead readAhead = ReadAhead.None)
    { ... }
}

Answer 1

The exact equivalent of Task.Yield().ConfigureAwait(false) (which doesn't exist since ConfigureAwait is a method on Task and Task.Yield returns a custom awaitable) is simply using Task.Factory.StartNew with CancellationToken.None, TaskCreationOptions.PreferFairness and TaskScheduler.Current. In most cases however, Task.Run (which uses the default TaskScheduler) is close enough.

You can verify that by looking at the source for YieldAwaiter and see that it uses ThreadPool.QueueUserWorkItem/ThreadPool.UnsafeQueueUserWorkItem when TaskScheduler.Current is the default one (i.e. thread pool) and Task.Factory.StartNew when it isn't.

You can however create your own awaitable (as I did) that mimics YieldAwaitable but disregards the SynchronizationContext:

async Task Run(int input)
{
    await new NoContextYieldAwaitable();
    // executed on a ThreadPool thread
}

public struct NoContextYieldAwaitable
{
    public NoContextYieldAwaiter GetAwaiter() { return new NoContextYieldAwaiter(); }
    public struct NoContextYieldAwaiter : INotifyCompletion
    {
        public bool IsCompleted { get { return false; } }
        public void OnCompleted(Action continuation)
        {
            var scheduler = TaskScheduler.Current;
            if (scheduler == TaskScheduler.Default)
            {
                ThreadPool.QueueUserWorkItem(RunAction, continuation);
            }
            else
            {
                Task.Factory.StartNew(continuation, CancellationToken.None, TaskCreationOptions.PreferFairness, scheduler);
            }
        }

        public void GetResult() { }
        private static void RunAction(object state) { ((Action)state)(); }
    }
}

Note: I don't recommend actually using NoContextYieldAwaitable, it's just an answer to your question. You should be using Task.Run (or Task.Factory.StartNew with a specific TaskScheduler)