Two threads inserting columns into same key followed by read gets unexpected results

[Scott McCarty <sc...@pana.ma>]

Hi,

I'm seeing a problem with inserting columns into one key using multiple
threads and I'm not sure if it's a bug or if it's my misunderstanding of how
insert/get_slice should work.

My setup is that I have two separate client processes, each with a single
thread, writing concurrently to Cassandra and each process is doing the same
thing:  read columns from one key and then use one of the column names as
the basis for another row key, and then insert into that new row key a
column whose name is unique to the process.  Each process then immediately
reads back the columns on that row key.

It's the reading back part that's showing inconsistent behavior:  most of
the time if Thread1 writes Column1 and Thread2 writes Column2 at about the
same time, things are consistent:  Thread1 sees either Column1 or it sees
Column1 and Column 2 (same for Thread2).  Both of those cases are expected
and indeed comprise 99% of the results.

Sometimes, however, Thread1 sees NO columns, and sometimes it sees Column2
(instead of Column1, as I'd expect).

Debug logs show that in failing cases, Thread1 completes its
insert/get_slice sequence BEFORE Thread2 starts its insert/get_slice, but
(in this example) Thread2 would get back NO columns.

I turned on debug level of logging on Cassandra and I saw that in at least
one case the two client requests are coming in at the exact same millisecond
so I'm wondering if there's some concurrency issue on the server.

I'm running linux with Java build 1.6.0_20-b02.  Cassandra is version 0.6.1
and I have one node in the cluster.  The consistency level for writing is
ALL and for reading it's ONE.  The clients are using the Java Hector
interface.  Both of the two client processes are on the same machine as the
Cassandra server (running on a dual-core processor).

This fails with 0.6.2 code also.

Am I wrong in thinking that an insert on a column with consistency level ALL
followed immediately by a get_slice should include that column?

Thanks

Scott McCarty

Re: Two threads inserting columns into same key followed by read gets unexpected results

[Jonathan Ellis <jb...@gmail.com>]

On Wed, May 26, 2010 at 11:11 AM, Scott McCarty <sc...@pana.ma> wrote:
> Am I wrong in thinking that an insert on a column with consistency level ALL
> followed immediately by a get_slice should include that column?

You are not wrong.  Can you create a ticket at
https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/CASSANDRA with as simple a test
case as you can, that demonstrates the problem?

-- 
Jonathan Ellis
Project Chair, Apache Cassandra
co-founder of Riptano, the source for professional Cassandra support
http://riptano.com