R/sFsocketRequest.R

In cn.farms: cn.FARMS - factor analysis for copy number estimation

## Functions copied from package snowfall (http://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/snowfall/index.html)
## as the package was removed from the CRAN repository.


#*****************************************************************************
# Functions for handling the connection to the controlling webserver.
#
# Base socketrequest follows code from post on R-help:
# http://tolstoy.newcastle.edu.au/R/devel/06/07/6196.html
#
# PARAMETER: Array|List Arguments (all Entries must be in format "name=val")
# RETURN:    Array result from webserver
# THROWS:    Exception Connection Error
#*****************************************************************************
connectWebserver <- function( call.args ) {
  host <- "www.imbi.uni-freiburg.de"
  path <- "/bib/bib.pl"
  
  # Parameters for the call.
  dat  <- paste( call.args, collapse="&", sep="" )
  
  len <- length( strsplit(dat,"")[[1]] )
  
  request <- paste( "POST ", path, " HTTP/1.0\nHost: ", host,
      "\nReferer:\n",
      "Content-type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded\n",
      "Content-length: ", len,
      "\nConnection: Keep-Alive\n\n", dat, sep="" )
  
  sock <- NULL      # Needed in catch-Block for disconnect
  readSock <- ""
  
  # Connect. Catch exceptions regarding to connection errors.
  exception <- try( {
        sock <- socketConnection( host=host, port=80,
            server=FALSE, blocking=TRUE )
        
        write( request, sock )
        socketSelect( list( sock ) )
        readSock <- readLines( sock )
        close( sock )
      }, silent=FALSE )
  
  if( inherits( exception, "try-error" ) ) {
    cat( "Error connecting to: ", host, path, dat, "\n" )
    
    # If socket exists, close it.
    if( sock != NULL ) close( sock )
    
    stop()
  }
  
  return( readSock )
}

##connectWebserver( c( "kat=ben", "cmd=list", "usr=jo", "usr_sel=JO" ) )